The Rectum is a Tomb
by SekritOMG
Summary: It's summer in 1980s London, and Stan is blissfully unaware that after the rentboy comes the flood.
1. Chapter 1

1. This story is an AU homage to Alan Hollinghurst, written in his style.

2. Foodstamp has given me a lot of input on this story, and I really owe her public acknowledgment for that.

3. I am not British. If you are British and have some feedback, I welcome it.

4. It's just occurred to me that this is the first thing I've posted in the first-person. I swore I couldn't do it, but I didn't even realize I was until I was pretty far into this. It's all because of Hollinghurst.

I'm really pretty nervous about this, and I hope you enjoy it.

* * *

The crowd at the Bucky was typically thin on weekday nights, and tonight was no exception. It was another dreary Monday evening, the end of a dreary Monday proper, during which I'd done the dreary thing I always seemed to be doing: writing. Here I was, at 37, no closer to the superstardom or celebrity I so readily deserved than I had been at 36 or 35 or even 21. In typical fashion, my date, as it were, was late again. But knowing him as I did I went right ahead and ordered a Scotch whisky from the waiter. The Duke of Buckingham was a somber pub with an all-homosexual clientele, although these days it seemed more and more tourists were stumbling in, unaware, clutching each other's arms and squealing, "Look, dear, it's an authentic British pub!" before ordering fish and chips or Yorkshire pudding, something like that. No, these tourists weren't even well-informed enough to be aware of let alone understand the concept of a pudding in this context. I suppose when they managed to seep in to trample on the decades-old salmon-colored carpet, they asked for bangers and mash with a wry little grin preceding a self-satisfied smile as if they too belonged somehow in a gay pub (not that they were aware it was meant to cater to a select group) eating pathetic mash made from half-fat milk and powder and sausages the fat black chef had picked up at the Tesco on his way to work in the afternoon. "Bangers, ha ha ha," they generally crowed, and I found it quite annoying, being as if I ever came to the Bucky it was to meet a dear old friend or two (albeit very rarely was I meeting two). Little did they know that on Saturday afternoons the large groups of queens who populated this space would have the same laugh over the same damn pun and rib each other over the irony of eating a slang-termed late brunch in order to cure themselves of the most dreadful hangovers, the likes of which I'm certain were procured in the lead-up to the previous night's banging.

I suppose I couldn't blame the tourists for coming in, for seeking refuge from our cobbled alleyways in here. It was purposefully hidden, such as it was, down St. Anne's Court, which was serendipitously wedged between Soho Square and the theater district. (Not that I had any use for milling around the West End these days, sad as it was that it seemed every third debut was for a splashy musical rehashing the work of some former great — or perhaps not — artist into trite fair for children and other easily bored tourists.) This was the exact sort of thing my mind began to reel over while I waited for Kyle to show up to our long-standing Monday night drink-and-meal, which began at the Bucky and regretably often ended at the Bucky. As noted their food was sad fare, but then again Kyle was quite stingy and considered the bill for virtually any fare worth eating to be outlandishly pricey. For my coin, why not simply spend a bit extra and not treat one's digestive track like he was a naïve American on holiday? Still, good prices on the whisky, which pleased me greatly, as many establishments had long since cottoned onto the fact that most of us queers were ready and willing and able to pay out the nose for a cocktail, provided it came with an umbrella or the night ended in some stranger's apartment.

It occurred to me that perhaps I should be irate that Kyle was, as he was wont to be, 10 minutes late. He'd never had the common sense of punctuality. "I believe I've forgotten my pocket watch again, dear," he would often joke when he turned up to find me well into my second or third cup. Of course, as he wisely pointed out, my system absorbed alcohol like a thirsty plant; it took longer than usual to become quite saturated. Still, while I was contemplating making a show and acting quite disappointed in him, it occurred to me that I would never be able to feign disappointment in Kyle. He never had any excuse except for his own self-importance, and yet I would continue to forgive him until he was late to my funeral.

Although he was often dreadfully tardy Kyle was never truant entirely, and on this Monday evening he managed to show his face a few minutes before I finished my second whisky. I was about to signal the waiter (a young chap with bulging thighs) to come bring me an anticipatory third, when who should appear but my date, soaked though he was from the ceaseless summer downpour.

Kyle did not look happy. Being that we had been so close for nearly 20 years — since the first term of university, as it happened — I knew how to read him like a book. His shoulders were slumped, his eyes were downcast, and his perfectly plump lower lip was pouted just so slightly. What signaled to me that something deeper had gone awry was his hair. Where he usually sported a silken growth of somewhat-redder-than-auburn curls, his hair had been quite recently sheared, so that it merely brushed the upper ridges of his ears. I should call this a fairly dramatic cut, being that Kyle's hair was one of his ongoing pet projects. He wasted ("Spent," I imagined he might correct me) hundreds of quid on this compelling feature of his, as it took nearly ten years and the talents of an especially well-practiced girl off Kensington High Street to force it into a presentable style. And here he was, looking visibly miserable, or rather more visibly miserable than I'd last seen him on Saturday night, perched on the thighs of that incomprehensible Frenchman, giggling like a naughty nun or something likewise ridiculous. More worrying was this appalling haircut.

"Darling," I said cordially, extending a gracious hand toward the chair on the other side of the table.

"It's Christophe," he moaned, not managing to seat himself. "He's left me."

"Darling!" I got up from my seat, and brought him to the banquette. "Here, here," I said encouragingly, foisting the ends of my drink at him. Kyle did not drink whisky though, so he rejected it, and slumped against my shoulder. "You must tell me everything. What did he say? What did he do?"

"Oh, you know how it is," he said dismissively, defeat pervading his words in a heartbreaking way. I did not know how it was; I had not had a relationship in three years, and I had ended the last one. Ironically, it was Kyle I was after; I had been hard-up for him since he invited me to spend the summer with his family after our first year. I couldn't pinpoint the moment when this steely lust had softened into full-blossomed pining, but even I had to admit that the sympathetic-mate act sometimes wore me down. "They feed you these clichés, you know, 'You're so much better than I' or 'We must remain close' or 'And while I was fucking him, I think I contracted the clap, so you may want to have that checked out, and by the by, I shan't be paying for it.' " Kyle heaved a deep sigh, and curled his hand into mine. "Why, Stanley? Why must I be doomed to live what little time on this green Earth I have left pining for an as-yet unmet phantasm of a man who won't leave me to die alone like the wretch I feel like?"

"So you're not quite over it yet," I tried to joke, dryly.

"I'm quite miserable," Kyle wailed, and then he buried his face in my armpit. I attempted to be loving and platonic, or to walk that line between loving and platonic that gay men often tread. Of course, I ended up stroking his dry, short hair, which I in turn found somewhat upsetting.

"Darling," I said softly. "Why ever did you destroy your lovely hair?"

Kyle raised his head, and gave a dramatic sniffle. "Oh, it's all Chris' fault, that rogue bastard," he seethed. "I don't know what possessed me, dear, I really don't, except that as I was eating a prawn mayo sandwich on my lunch break I happened to amble by a salon, and the sight of a shears reminded me of the way that wonderful terrible man would yank on my hair when we were…" He trailed off, and blushed. "Well," he said with a cough. "When I got back to the office I immediately called Evelyn" — Evelyn being his stylist —"and told her the dreadful news and asked if she'd squeeze me in. To my great luck, she had an opening. Of course, that was why I was late this evening. I hope you'll forgive me, Stanley, dear, but I just…" He trailed off again, and sighed. "They never stick around, do they?"

"Men can be so vile," I offered.

"And yet so lovely," he said dreamily. "Are you in the mood for a bite? I've been stuffing myself silly all day. I think I've been starving myself for Christophe for too long, but he's gone now, isn't he?"

"How did this break happen, exactly?" I asked.

"Hold on," he said gingerly, getting up. "I'll go order some mash and bangers at the bar. Care for a top-up?" he glanced down at my empty cup.

"Yes," I said wryly. "Thank you, darling."

"My pleasure." He departed.

XXX

After putting away three bangers, a pile of mash, a steak-and-ale pie, and half of a curry, Kyle leaned back in his seat and said, "Are you ready to hear my sad tale now?"

"Yes," I answered, wiping my hands on a napkin. I'd been eating some chips with gravy as a sign of solidarity, although I wasn't much enjoying it. "Please tell."

"Well, dear." Kyle removed his napkin from his lap. "There isn't much to tell, I'm afraid. He's been staying with me for about two months, as you know, and when I returned from our night out on Saturday, he was missing, as were my best steak knives."

"So he pilfered your silver." I was unimpressed.

"Oh, it's more than all that." I was always amazed at how quickly Kyle's misery could morph into indignation, or one of its emotional kin. "He was never anything but a hoodlum, of course; taking my knives was about the best I could hope for when it ended."

I nodded in mock-sympathy, when really I was glowing in triumph on the inside. Kyle had a tested affinity for these tall, dark, hardened, dirty, strong men. Vandals, sometimes, but often they were just ex-military, or even businessmen with a nasty turn. As I matched Kyle's height exactly (was an inch shorter, when he'd done his hair), and sported no bulk, only a sleek, cultured swimmer's build, I was hopelessly out of the running. Nevertheless, there was no reason I shouldn't inwardly gloat when, at the end of these affairs, I was still here, and they had only made off with the flatware.

"The worst part is," Kyle was saying, his half-ginger cheeks burning in quaint fury, "the next night I went to the pub across the street to drown my sorrows, and I saw him canoodling with an MP! Well, that's the last straw, really. And there I was, all ready to forgive him, at least temporarily, and let him back in for a farewell go."

I grimaced. "It's … probably for the best that you didn't. How did you know this new bloke was an MP?"

"Oh, that." Kyle stiffened whenever he was talking about politics. "Well, when you know one, dear, you know them all."

Kyle certainly knew one, or, as it happened, all of them. His mother, an estimable American woman, was a member of that club. Sheila'd come over from Brooklyn — or Boston, or some seaside district where they cultivated highly nasal accents — on a Rhodes. There she met the incorruptible Gerald Broflovski, esquire, who was lecturing or in residence at Merton or something while she procured a second A.B. Now, 40 years on, she was a British citizen, with a seat in the Commons and everything. Gerald was still a barrister, and still wonderfully well-informed in the field of social justice. He had the habit of talking down to me whenever I came by as if I were a child who needed these pressing issues sorted out by an adult. I think he was influenced by the other men his son brought around: scoundrels, tough blokes, the sorts of men who would gladly not only steal the silver, but slit another's throat with it. I found them welcoming, and yet tedious. Mrs. Broflovski was a tireless crusader, although with each campaign her oncoming arthritis forced her to concede that perhaps this would be her last. So Kyle knew virtually all of these MPs, on sight at least if not by name or virtue.

"This one," he seethed, "is a radical rat bastard by the name of Gregory. I don't know the family name; I don't even know his district, as it happens. All I know is he was romancing my ex-lover, braying at some private joke while Christophe ran his hands through his blond hair. He had the whitest teeth." Kyle stopped, and rubbed his chin. "This sort of thing always happens to me, you know. I think I shall die an old maid."

"Oh, no," I assured him. "Your mate must out there. Why, perhaps he's simply eluding you, having been under your nose this whole time."

"I should like to think so. But what about you, Stanley? Don't you ever wonder if perhaps you'll meet _the one_?"

I sighed, and took a final drink of my whisky before answering. "I'm sure," I said slowly, smacking my lips, "he is closer than all that."

"I hope so." Kyle raised his glass of shandy in salute. "Well, dear, here's to us. At least I have you, you know. It's better to have mates, perhaps, than the most satisfying sex of all."

"That's preposterous," I replied. "When was the last time you had very satisfying sex?"

Kyle thought for a moment. "To be quite honest about it? On the walk home from the bar, while I was cursing Christophe and Gregory and radical politics and everything they all stood for together, I came across old Clyde." Kyle smiled fondly, and set his drink down. "Well, you know, I was miserable, he was obviously trolling for _something _— or as it happens, _someone_. So, that was that."

The color drained from my face. "Oh," I said dismally. "How is old Clyde?"

Before continuing Kyle took a swig of his drink. "Allow me to tell you this: He is unpredictably well-hung. Would you never have imagined? He's such a dreary little civil servant. It was beyond my wildest dreams, not to say I'd been dreaming of old Clyde for any reason."

"No, me neither." I was quite on the verge of having an apoplectic fit, if not from this information itself, then from the attempt to keep myself from exploding.

"But it's like I've always said," Kyle continued. He was quite oblivious to my discomfort. "You can always have sex with your friends, but you can never make friends out of your lovers."

"Ah." I swallowed. "What time is it?"

Kyle glanced around. "Well, dear," he sighed. "I'd tell you, but I think I've forgotten my pocket watch."

I checked my wrist. "It's half-eight already," I said, silently shaking. "Where does the time go?"

"I don't know," Kyle said. He finished his shandy, and began to take another bite of his lukewarm curry before thinking better of it. "Can I go home with you?" he asked. "I'd … I'd rather not be alone tonight."

"Of course," I said warmly, my tremors calming somewhat. "You've just been heartbroken, darling, so let me settle the bill."

"But you've eaten so much less than I," Kyle stated. Then he shrugged, his thrifty nature rearing its head. "Well, I'll make it up another time, won't I?"

"Surely," I muttered, making a dash toward the bar.

XXX

When Kyle asked to come home with me, he meant to sleep with me — in the same bed. We'd had our trysts, most notably in college. They were infrequent, and usually under the sustained influence of any number of intoxicants. I don't think either of us could recall to what extent they were satisfying. That was just one of the aspects of this so-called gay life I was rather beginning to dislike. It was all well and good to fuck your best mate, and in the morning he would just roll over and bemoan his head pain and you'd laugh over a basket of financiers and pain au chocolat about how you couldn't remember anything about the whole thing except for how ridiculous it all must have been.

He had a perfectly respectable apartment in Notting Hill Gate, and of course by 'perfectly respectable' I do mean lovely, and ostentatious, and lavish. Kyle was in advertising. All these years, and I'd never quite gotten the hang of what it was that he did, except that it involved very long lunch breaks and socializing with a number of catty, gabby women he seemed to tire of long before they married and he had to attend some social function, possibly a wedding. "I do hate weddings," Kyle was fond of saying. "It's never my own, of course, and then it's always such trouble finding an appropriate hat." He was also irked by the fact that the invitations never came for Mr. Kyle Broflovski _and Guest_, which he cited as a critical injustice. I tried to support him in this regard, too, although I truly felt one of these boorish men, Christophe or whoever, would be horribly risible in a tuxedo.

I lived in a ramshackle mess of rooms over Hoxton Square. Kyle had serious reservations about taking the Underground to Old Street, thinking it unsafe. I found it no more unsafe than anyplace else, really, and the idea of finding a taxi preposterous. But Kyle was adamant, so I stood on the curb with my arm stuck out like a tourist or a fascist, holding my trench closed, as I was too lazy to secure the buttons. Perhaps if I had one reason to like what was happening around Soho, it was the ease of taxi procurement. I think most foreigners were unaware of how small central London was, really, or how easy it was to traverse the town by foot or even bus without resorting to cab. Still, there was something stately, grim, and romantic about paying a man to take you away, thinking not about where you were going or the ever-troubling problem of the meter.

I cannot overstate the frustration of being so intimate with a man I yearned for so intensely, and so persistently. Despite his inheritance of his mother's shapely features, Kyle fit well into most of my clothes, except the few things I hung onto that were tailored without a centimeter of error. (There is something deeply satisfying about turning up at a former lover's formal birthday luncheon dressed impeccably in something incorporating silk.) I lent Kyle a pair of striped pajamas, which he laughed at.

"I always imagine you asleep in the nude," he confided.

These little comments caught me off-guard whenever he casually dropped them into conversation.

"I make a point to go to bed like this so that in the unlikely case there's a fire or something, I won't have to _evacuate_ in the nude."

"I suppose if you didn't live in such a hideously industrial wasteland it wouldn't be a problem."

"I hardly find it industrial," I managed to choke out with mock-outrage. "I mean, look, there's a wonderfully pleasant green out there." I strode over to one of the windows and knocked on it.

"Oh, yes." Kyle nodded along with his sarcastic assessment. "Sadly one can't see the green through your dust-clouded windows."

"Well, if you dislike it so, why not go back to your wonderful flat and have a cocktail by yourself and count your lavish blessings?"

"How rude!" Kyle's annoyance was false, but he played it well. "I suppose you should be lucky I'm here with you; after all, it's not like you'd be doing anything pivotal up here on your own, would you?"

"I have a story to finish," I told him. As a writer, I found it fairly simple to maintain a certain standard of living by filling in the gaps with short columns for whatever publication was in need; usually it was some trashy gossip rag, although I found that sadly, virtually every paper was quickly tilting toward that standard. This assignment happened to be a breezy roman a clef about the son of the executive officer of a major brewing company. I hadn't any clue where these editors get these outlandish ideas — like, say, the idea to publish gossip in a fictive voice with jabbing judgmental commentary laced throughout. Still, it was factual gossip, which I suppose was the nobler sort. Some months I soured on the scandal racket, and found myself disinterested in taking on these jobs. In those times, I found it easy enough to rely on my father for some income; wheedling usually worked on him, although even I could admit that as a youth, I never imaged my 37-year-old self as the type of man who routinely called upon his father to support me in my frivolous career as a dour aesthete who enjoyed drinking whisky on weeknights and champagne on the weekends, every weekend. Still, a man could be excused of such things, I think; there had to be some merit in enjoying oneself.

It was easy enough to wonder what my father would think of his only son spending another Monday night in his pajamas, drinking sherry with his old friend as they discussed escape routes out of the building.

"Of course," Kyle concluded, "if your sprinklers went off, these lovely cotton pajamas would be ruined."

"It's nothing laundering wouldn't fix," I told him.

Kyle wept a bit more over Christophe, and I did try to be supportive, but I had long since realized that Kyle loved performing his disappointment for me far more than he was able to take solace from my reassurance or even my schadenfreude. It was a little ritual for us. Being a lapsed Catholic of the highest degree, Kyle was the object of my devotion now, and going through these cycles with him was the closest I ever came to worship.

"Do you remember the night we met?" he asked, weepily, referring to himself and Christophe. Of course I did; it was another routine evening out, and he swaggered into the club sucking on the end of a cigarette like it was candy. He cruised Kyle rather thoroughly, choosing not to send him drinks at our table but to come over himself and simply pluck Kyle out of his seat and carry him toward the dance floor. I was sure the attraction was completely genuine, and yet it was obvious to me that a Frenchman — any Frenchman, no matter how toned his arms were — looking to cohabitate with a bloke he picked up in a club (literally!) was only in search of a temporary arrangement.

Still, I did not like to see him hurting, as much as I enjoyed seeing him hurt. As the night crept forward, I continued pouring him glasses of sherry, stroking what was left of his hair and offering reassurances. Finally, around midnight, he took my hand away from his ear and asked me, "Why did I cut my hair off? I must look like something of a lesbian now."

"You are certainly the most attractive lesbian I have ever met."

We giggled about this. Neither of us knew any lesbians, mind you; they were roughly mythological creatures to us, and yet we were all too certain we'd recoil at the sight of one. In this way, I suppose they were like the modern-day Chimera or something. Or perhaps there were a Hydratic concept, many-headed and too complex for us. Still, we toasted to our good fortune to have never identified one in the wild. After this, we realized we'd finished all of my sherry, although with the pacing, my tolerance, and Kyle's grand consumption, neither of us was really particularly drunk.

"So I won't be ill tomorrow, fancy that," Kyle mused. "Shall we?" I nodded, and took his arm, and let him lead me to my own bed, a wonderfully large-affair on a platform upstairs in the great tangle of lofted space of which my flat consisted. We curled up together, and Kyle summarized his latest muck-up of a fling: "Disastrous."

"At least you're having these trysts," I mused. "How must it feel, do you think, to go from one lurid park toilet to the next, settling to fuck men you meet in the gym showers?"

"Oh, are you complaining?" Kyle asked. "As I recall, after Gary, you were quite adamant you would never date again."

"Until I find the one," I told him.

"Well." Kyle reached over and turned out the bedside lamp. He rolled back toward me, and wrapped his arms around my torso. "Let us remember, Stanley dear, that we do have each other. Of course I expect you know by now that I would rather have you than any single piece of manhood in England."

"What about the Commonwealth?" I asked, secretly wondering why he only seemed to feel this way in the wake of his romantic follies.

"There, too." He kissed me, tenderly, on the lips, and tucked his head beside my shoulder. He closed his eyes and said, "Good night, dear."

"Good night, darling."

"Do wake me if you get up first."

Before too long I heard his soft snoring permeate my bedroom. With some difficulty I managed to fall asleep, dreaming of looming deadlines and men at oaken desks ordering me to have my cock cut off.

XXX

When I awoke in the morning, Kyle was gone. He was not in the habit of composing notes, but I knew well enough that he had probably called a taxi and gone back to his flat so he could shower and dress for work. Some weekend nights after parties if Kyle came home with me, he would still be there in the morning. For that matter, if I was sleeping over at his, I was generally awoken when he did, and given some breakfast before being hustled out. I wasn't sure that Kyle enjoyed his frivolous work, but if there was one thing his parents had instilled in him, it was an instinct to take business quite seriously. This made him, from 9 in the morning to 5 in the afternoon, something of a frenzied bore. He did, however, tend to a take an hour-long lunch break, which seemed to last for two hours. I sometimes met him, unless of course I was just rousing at noon, which was the case today.

His absence on these mid-mornings saddened me, but it was a very familiar sadness. In a very real way, I had been living with this absence since I'd met him. He was there, and he was not, like a phantom lover. In my youth it was very unsettling; now it was a well-worn melancholy; a perpetual longing. I think it must have been far more normal to me now than true contentment would have been. Or, perhaps it was the case that I was content, as I was not depressed, but I certainly wasn't … well, the correct word was probably 'exuberant.'

It was nearing 1 p.m., so I put a kettle on, and sat down at the wood-block table I kept near my kitchen. Or perhaps it was _in_ my kitchen; I found the distinction very difficult to make, as my flat consisted of one very large space with several smaller catacomb-like rooms and a loft where I slept. Someday, the excavation of these annexes would prove profitable, I was certain, having spent years filling them with all varieties of inheritances from relatives deceased and living. My parents in particular liked to surprise me with a boot full of old rubbish, citing my ample storage space. "Perhaps _this_ is valuable," my father would suggest, shoving faded faux-velvet boxes of broken bits of Bakelite jewelry into my spare rooms.

"No, it's not," I'd reply, "which is why you've been quite unable to foist it off on some unsuspecting antiquities dealer, and are therefore imposing it on me." At which point my father would whine and groan and launch into an overwrought tantrum about how if I expected him to continue distributing his wealth (such as it was) at any time prior to his extinguishment, I had better shut my mouth and let him use my living space as gratis storage. Usually it was not a long wait to discover that in fact my mother had gotten on him again about the lack of spare rooms in the dreary little row house I'd grown up in.

After rubbishy junk from my mother and father, I suppose the second largest source of clutter in my apartment was my collection of papers, all of which I'd managed to somehow jam into dusty towers of filing cabinets. As a writer — an occupation I loathed increasingly as the years went by — I was excessively paranoid about letting a single one of my papers get out of sight. In the two-odd decades since I'd gone down from Magdalen, I'd managed somehow by sheer luck or the skin of my teeth to publish two novels, both of which were fairly dense with flowery language. Neither was a critical or a commercial success, but the truth about publishing was that I had been generally fortunate enough to have been paid by advance — not millions of quid, but enough, so it hardly mattered to me whether or not anyone, professional or literary or commoner or uneducated, liked my books. My payment had come regardless of their ability to perform, not unlike the way some men were able to continue having sex. When I thought back on it, my so-called professional life seemed to mirror my personal life in that I hardly would call myself a wonderful lay, and yet I was never left wondering when my next paycheck (so to speak) would arrive; it just always did, because in some horrible way horny men are like book publishers: They are willing to take a chance on anything, or almost everything. Here I was, very nearly 40, and I deeply felt as if I'd squandered too many resources. I tried to console myself with the fact that it was hardly my responsibility to feel guilt over where and when other entities were liable to take liberties with their cash or their erections. It hardly mattered. When I was nearing 30, it really bothered me, but in the ensuing 10 years I suppose I'd mastered it. Nevertheless, I was horridly protective of my papers. Every draft of those two damn novels was stored in the cubby-like rooms off the larger space of the flat, which I'd purchased with my first advance more or less with the idea of keeping drawer after drawer of drafts safe from interlopers. What a fancy! I had been so naïve.

When my tea was done I put it next to me to steep and sat down at the typewriter, which was how I enjoyed writing. At some point in my life it had occurred to me that I was never going to be the next Waugh, so I may as well drop the act and just write on a word processor like a contemporary. But then, possibly drunk, I rebelled against my own common sense. I didn't care if what I handed in was riddled with errors, although if I was suspiciously and unusually concerned about impressing an editor I might whip out a red pen and correct my own work, as if I were something of an editor myself. I suppose the truth was that I had never been proud of what I was doing, and since it hardly made me happy I did not care if it was presentable or reasonable or even very good. The problem with all of this was that I didn't know what else I could do that I would be much better at, or what might make me any happier. Despite Kyle's nervous jokes about becoming his secretary, I would have been horrible at that. The only thing I had any interest in cataloguing was my own yellowing collection of novel leaves and rejected manuscripts. And that was only something of a pet project.

Around the time I was tapping out the last few lines of my assignment, the telephone rang. Determined to finish the damn story so that I could spend the rest of my week stalking pretty young things in the Kensington Gardens lavatory, I ignored it. I managed to commit another four words when the phone began crying out a second time. I had about four phones in the flat, one in the loft and the other three placed in sufficiently strategic positions so that I never had to walk far across the barren hardwood floors to get a call. I hit the space bar furiously, and went to the coffee table, for which I was using an old leather trunk with a lace table cloth over it. I also had a great interest in princess-style phones — of which I'd only managed to collect one over the years, a gift from Kyle for the holidays one year, in exchange for the outrageous oversized black rubber dildo I'd given him. Make a comment, if you like, but it was what he wanted, and I knew he got an awful lot of use out of it. It was one of those serendipitous gifts that managed to please both the gifter and the recipient, and I certainly had gotten my own share of use out of it, indirectly, imagining what Kyle must have looked like while making use of the overpriced dildo I'd bought him. Perhaps when I was still at school, thinking about my best mate impaling himself on a black cock of any variety, fake or real, would have made me extremely guilty and caused me to sulk. These days, it had rather a reverse effect, forcing me to become quite horny. I suppose the point of this anecdote was that when I spoke on the telephone Kyle had given me, I inevitably became hard. This gave phone sex a lurid, illicit third dimension of naughtiness, but even normal conversations became arousing because of it. I felt myself stiffening even before I picked up the phone and barked, "What?"

"Stanley," a female voice lilted. "There's no need to yell, mon cher, it is simply too early for yelling."

"Wendy," I sighed. I immediately felt wretched for snapping at her. "How's tricks?"

"Oh, you know, perfectly dreadful."

"By which you mean…"

She swallowed; I always heard when she swallowed over the telephone. I do not know how I could hear the viscous rivers of saliva in her mouth but I certainly could, and it was one of the few things I felt never merited mention to her, to whom I told almost every other thing about my life. Each thought and idea I had, no matter how wild or unsavory or brilliant, was filtered through Wendy.

"It's such a horrible day, isn't it?" she asked. It occurred to that I hadn't even looked outside today, although by her comment I noticed it was actually quite light out.

"No, dear, I'm afraid I don't know what you mean. It's very bright out, isn't it? Looks very warm."

"I don't mean the weather, you old fool, I mean the energy, or some like concept. Don't you just feel it's going to be a monstrous day?"

"Really I don't. How do you mean?"

When I questioned her, she always became somewhat irritable. "I can't describe it," she snapped. Then she returned to savory form: "I'd be remiss if I didn't ask you to tea today, Stanley. I hope you're not busy."

"I'm never busy, or rather, never too busy," I answered. "Why? Haven't you got anyone else to have tea with?"

"Not to be insulting, dearest, but I wish I did. You're always in such a moody way recently."

"I am not." She could have said the same thing about herself.

"Well, I've not seen you for so long now, it feels like. Why don't you come take tea with me, hmm? I'll serve those sandwiches you like." If there was ever a reason to go to Wendy's, it wasn't to sit in the seemingly endless cushions of her parlor couches; it was to consume coronation chicken sandwiches, have a cup of tea, and relish the fact that your life could never be as dismal as hers was. Likewise, I think she often silently thanked God or fortune that her life wasn't quite like mine. Nevertheless, aside from Kyle, she was certainly my dearest friend.

"I think I shall be able to make it. Shall we say 4?"

"Yes, yes, 4."

"Will Lady Stevens be in attendance?"

"No." She said this with firmness and in her voice, meant obviously to bolster me, as I had never been a great fan. "Bebe will not be there, I'm afraid. She's enjoying the Cote d'Azur this month."

Bebe was a woman who was well-equipped with intelligence of some variety, for it clearly took some talent to play her games, gossip-mongering and contact-acquisition. Still, she apparently was entirely uninformed on the matter of discerning which gentlemen were gay. I had no idea what Bebe was short for, and in complete honesty I should confess that I didn't want to know. Babette or something, probably; something overinflated and girlish. I did not like her, and I knew that Wendy's appreciation of her company completely accommodated my dislike. Still, she often made eyes at me; very clear eyes, at that; beckoning eyes; flirtatious eyes. I was always polite, although once at a tea she did get rather grabby after the other ladies had cleared out of the parlor. It was beyond my comprehension why she never simply did the computations and asked why her best friend had no children, or why she kept company with a confirmed bachelor, or why said bachelor was always the sole male (single or otherwise) at social functions in the private female sphere of Black House.

"What a shame," I lied. "I shall see you at 4, then."

"Good, good," Wendy concluded. "I shall look forward to it, dearest."

We hung up, and I took a moment to fondle my erection through my pants. It might have been a good time to abandon work on this project and go down to the lavatory at the coffee shop on Old Street and perhaps find a bloke whose company I could enjoy, but I thought it over and realized that I had only a couple of hours to finish the story, run it down to Fleet Street, and then jog back over to her place. In lieu of indulging myself in this way I decided to have a quick wank — a very quick one, truly, not one of these drawn-out luxuriant ones for which I'd draw a bath and bring in a porno mag or something and really enjoy the process. No, this would have to be efficient. I leaned back on the sofa and spread my legs and shut my eyes, instinctively running my palms over my thighs. After a brief delay I drew my cock out of my pants and really made quick work of the whole thing, coming into my hand so as not to waste any more time cleaning or laundering anything. If there was one thing I had learned the hard way, it was that semen was very difficult to get out of lace.

XXX

After dropping my draft, I hopped on the Underground. I'd taken the bus there, and tried to walk to Wendy's, but found myself tiring when I realized that I was near the Holborn stop anyway. I was at Bond Street very quickly, feeling quite wonderful about myself having completed some legitimate if unglamorous work, and having been cruised on the Tube not once but twice. Or, rather, I was cruised once as I made my way through the turnstile, by a man who clearly enjoyed watching me pass through it from behind, and once on the train itself, by a really old sort of gent without any hair who quite visibly had his hand stuck inside his trench coat. He kept winking and nodding at me and at one point, he whistled. If it had just been me and him on an empty car I might have been disgusted, but his attention was precarious and fleeting, caught between the attentions and conversations of a handful of other passengers. In the end, I felt it was a compliment, maybe a comment on my lingering youth. No grey was yet creeping into my sideburns, and I still managed to swim my laps every other day. I felt bad for men like these, for when they were in their prime or even just clinging to it, they were relegated to the toilets in gymnasiums and the back rooms of bars. I myself spent plenty of time screwing in overly moist environs, but I was hardly hiding anything.

After disembarking I hustled to my destination, wondering if perhaps it was too rude of me to have neglected to bring flowers or a tart of some kind. Thinking my homosexuality a sign of faultless manners, my mother and sister both often called me to inquire about things like hostess gifts and calling cards. Truthfully, I had never in my life picked up a book about etiquette, and I barely knew what I was doing half the time. I hardly felt I was making a remarkable transgression. Wendy, after all, was truly one of my closest friends, and I came for tea at least weekly.

I met Viscountess Black when she was still Lady Testaburger. She was the first noblewoman who found it necessary to speak to me for no apparently reason, out of inkling to kindle a friendship, in genuine warmth. I don't know why I felt particularly pressed to attend the choir concert that evening, but as a 19-year-old lad I think I felt that the rampant amount of gay sex I was having needed some serious absolution, and yet as a Catholic I was struggling to find a way to rectify what I thought to be my natural habits with what society expected of me. I hadn't been to Confession or gone with my parents to any formal functions or services since I was 15, when I woke up one Sunday morning after another night of scandalous nocturnal emissions hinging on my deep yet concealed lust for males. Regardless, here I was now. I was entirely unsure of whether I was looking for another outlet for my abandoned faith, or if the idea of a Wednesday night concert in the chapel appealed to me based on the combined merits of the young men singing, and the silken quality of their holy voices rising to a tumescent quality of song. All I knew was that I was developing a taste for religious and operatic music at the time, having bought an LP of _La Traviata_ at a store in town, and lo and behold, the future viscountess sat down next to me, grabbed my forearm, and leaned in to whisper, "I thought buggers immolated in church."

If anyone else had done this to me, I would have been mortified, and stiffened — in body, that is — and gotten up when I overcame my pre-mortis rigor to hurry away as quickly as I could manage. But there was no judgment in Wendy's voice, just keen awareness. So I smiled, slyly, and said to her, leaning in subtly, "I sincerely hope you'll refrain from determining personal information about my character until at least allowing me to bend you over the altar, my dear."

"Single men," she continued, removing a missal from her pocketbook, "who come alone to church concertos on weekday nights instead of studying are almost always either future clergymen or buggers." She removed her hand from my arm. "And I find you significantly more attractive than a holy man, I'm sorry to say."

"Don't be sorry." I was all-out grinning now, pleased to be thought attractive by very nearly anyone, so vain was I at the time.

Afterwards, she introduced herself. "Must I call you Lady Testaburger?" I asked.

"No, you'll find me something of a forward-thinking daughter of a curiously liberal countess. You may call me by my Christian name; in fact, I do insist." She told me she was reading French, and asked me back to her rooms for the first of many teas. "I find buggery _fascinating_," she confessed. "Tell me, Stanley. Would you mind terribly if I inquired about your personal life?"

"I should only mind if you continued to use the term 'bugger.' It's so very Queensberry of you."

She blushed and apologized, and I did proceed to regale her with tales of my collegiate and current bedroom activities, not that I felt I had to keep them relegated to any sort of bedroom. At the outset her eyes widened, but after a few stories I considered rather shocking, because I'd been shocked by them myself as they were occurring, she eased into it, and I think I am not incorrect to surmise that she took a profound satisfaction from hearing about the romantic-sexual goings-on between two (or more, perhaps) attractive men. Let us say that girls were not a thing I was exposed to quite regularly up to this point in my life, and not because I preferred male company at all — England at this time, in my sphere, seemed to be quite gender-segregated, almost as if the social institution were fostering same-sex illicit relations and preferences. I had an older sister who may very well have been an older brother, as she was aggressive and whiffed out, I think, even before I had grasped onto it that there was something different about me, and readily took me to task for it. I socialized up until then with a majority of young boys, the sons of my father's colleagues and my mother's sewing circle members. I was entered into all-boys' school after all-boys' school until I landed at Oxford, not particularly eager to meet any women until this one had approached me in the most unlikely of places.

In the midst of our conversation that evening, she stopped me, and poured herself another cup of tea. "I hesitate to point this out, Stanley, because I think you are unaware of it, but I think it's all for the better if I do," she began. Setting the teapot down, she swallowed the first of many swallows. "It appears to me that even as you recount for me your various sexual exploits, the narrative always returns to this friend of yours."

This made me nervous, and I was not used to being made nervous by girls, or really at all anymore, so I said, "That's right, I guess."

"Is he your boyfriend?"

It was an odd, odd question for me. She was asking about Kyle, of course, whom I'd met almost immediately upon entering Magdalen. It was true that I spent about 80 percent of my time with him, and the bulk of my stories did end with either a comparison to some of his virtues or quirks, or his reaction to whatever trick I'd just turned, judgmental or not. Usually he was judgmental, and quick to write off any boy I'd had as unworthy of my time. And yet he wasn't my boyfriend, and later would commence carefully carrying on his own rather tumultuous affair, which I'd had something of a minimal hand in bringing about. It was as if the emotional role he filled was annoying Wendy, and having just made what I thought would be my second very good friend, I told her, "No, he is certainly not my boyfriend."

"Well, well." She sipped some tea. "Far be it from me to speak on the subject, but I should say you've got it bad for him."

"Well, so what if I do?" The truth was, I had it bad in some way for just about every good-looking boy I met. It didn't take a lot of wheedling to get me to admit, however, that I had it worst for Kyle. If only my first-year self had declined to summer with him, perhaps it might have ended in a fling or something.

"I don't know if there is any kind of direct correlation, but I feel the need to tell _someone_ this," she began, before proceeding to tell me she'd just illegally had an abortion. "I think I actually wanted to have it, you know. But I knew, I knew somehow." She paused. "The bloke, you see. He was a lot of things, but he wasn't either of the important things. Namely, he wasn't titled, which is sort of sad. Isn't it? That I would break it off with a lad I rather liked for that? I just think it's so, so miserable. Maybe I shouldn't care. But, you know, my father. He hasn't got a son, you know. I don't know about his peerage; I know it shall die with him. But I'm sure he wants to at least see it stay with his genes. Some common bastard legacy wouldn't do, you know."

"That's horrible."

"I know, I know." She swallowed again.

"The second thing," I reminded her. "What's the other thing that he wasn't?"

She had been looking into her teacup, but she took this moment to draw her eyes away from it and focus them back on me. "Ah, that." She sat up straighter, seemingly recovered from her little pity party. "He wasn't straight, as they say."

I groaned. "You're meaning to tell me you just had the child of some homosexual commoner aborted."

"Well, yes," she said. "I told you I was fascinated by bug—" She caught herself. "Homosexuals."

"And yet you convinced one to have sex with you."

"I suppose so, yes."

"Does he know about this whole … mess?"

"Oh, heavens no."

It may seem unlikely, but I assure you that I didn't ask her who this man was, or where he had come from, or what happened to him. I had known Wendy now for very nearly two decades, and I was not lacking in acquaintances, but in Wendy I felt I had a friend to whom I could tell mostly anything, and she would want to hear it, and very rarely recoiled. She, however, had a handful of very close female friends, all of whom were either in possession of courtesy titles, through their fathers, or married to a peer or an heir or something. Very moneyed, very high, very all of it, really, and I didn't know any of them _too_ well, although like I said, I attended tea and sometimes dinners with these ladies at least monthly, if not more frequently, depending, of course, on my schedule. At the outset it was bothersome that she seemed to view me as another girlfriend with a single crucial difference, but I knew, truly, that she cared for me, and valued my opinion. It was, in fact, I who had gotten her where she was now, and it was remarkable that up to this point she didn't feel the need to turn on me in hostility for condemning her to her current misery.

The crux of the issue was this: As the end of school neared, and the prospect of going down loomed, I was making it on a semi-regular basis with an incredibly handsome black man. I knew him, as I knew almost all of my group of friends at this point: We were reading for the same English degree under the tutorage of the same man. I don't think any of us liked to brag about being one of Garrison's boys, but the majority of us in the year sitting the exams intended to do nothing with the education we'd just gotten. I had my half-baked ideas about writing, and Kyle had almost instantly asked his father to find him a job with some contact of his, so long as it made a lot of money. But the well-heeled sons of lords and ladies would never in their wildest dreams require an education for any kind of practical reason, set as all of them were for life with endowments real or imagined.

Token was one of these lucky fellows who wasn't in need of much in life: gorgeous, utterly gorgeous, in a rather shamefully oriental way. I was most interested in his cock, of course, marveling at its naturalistic heft — it was almost how I imagined being transported to the feral Africa of my grandfather's colonial days must have been, having that monster stuck up in me like a spear. He was soft-spoken and self-confident, and a bit self-conscious, aware as he was of how awkward it was to be a member of an incredibly small segment of the population. If Kyle ever asked what it was we were getting up to in his rooms at nights, I merely demurred and told Kyle we were studying, and then as a sick joke I might make an offhand reference to Conrad or something, implying something a bit less innocent than simple reading, and perhaps Kyle got the message about the moist mess that was the jungle in those tomes, poisonous plants and rivers included.

Not to become too bungled up in Kyle's readings of these situations, I will cut to the point: Token was under pressure, lots of pressure, to bring home a noble bride from school, and as could only be expected by anyone who'd had the great fortune to become acquainted with his smooth, ripe masculinity, he had been failing in this task. His father was that rare breed of peer, a nobleman with a calling, and the elder Lord Black's business-like approach to these situations only served to stifle his son's efficacy. I could not imagine what it would be like to hide my own yearnings from anyone. At my worst, I simply chose not to speak about my sexuality, and hoped taking it off the table or deciding not to advertise it was good enough in the few situations where it might have a negative affect, such as at a social function engineered by my father, or a meeting about some of my nonliterary work. Token, on the other hand, was quite boldly hiding the entire thing from everyone, except the men he made mad, rushed love to, and the floundering, faithful wife he knew through me. Which was not to say Wendy'd never strayed; of course she had. But, as the years marched on, her general attraction to anyone seemed to cool, as it did with most women, and now her unyielding, impossible task was to give her husband an heir, and the earl a tangible reason not to fret over the future of his dynasty. So far, at this she was failing.

Our teas, particularly teas at which I was the only guest, went like this one did. A servant — I hardly paid attention to them, unless they turned out to be a particular boy I might like to fuck, and then _that_ was the endpoint of my attention — led me to the parlor, where I was sat at a table set for tea, and forced to wait until the viscountess felt like joining me. Usually it did not take long, and tea was poured, and I was given my choice of very stout little tea sandwiches, which I would purse my lips over and point to on a silver, doily-laden tray, declaring, "That one!" and then moving onto the next and deciding, "That one!" again until I had enough tea sandwiches. The cook at Black House made a really delicious Coronation chicken, exactly the way I liked it — very smooth, spiced, no currants. I knew it was _slightly_ racist of me to think so, seeing as it was another continent entirely, but the whole colonial thing reminded me of the viscount himself, the way he tasted exotic and filling at the same time. Wendy had some very, very good teas indeed — lapsangs and oolongs and things she just fixed together in her boredom. I felt bad that I was the one who got her stuck here: contemplating how to convince a man who had tried quite remarkably hard and failed to love her to give it another try, and then another try, until their congress made something of itself. The only thing that ever came of my congress was laundry bills, and I never wanted it to amount to anything else. The idea of being expected not just to perform but to _perform_ terrified me.

"I think today is just a horrible day," she almost immediately after the sandwich-distributor had left us. Over the past couple of months, I'd noticed her beginning to take sugar, which she never had done in the past. "I mean." She licked some crystalline remnants of a sugar cube off her thumb. "Do you ever just think things have gotten as bad as they can possibly get?"

"I don't quite don't know what to say, dearest. I mean, it's sunny today, after all. I didn't think it ever would stop raining, but it did, didn't it, so this must be the start of something wonderful."

"What is being started, though, I wonder?" she asked me.

"Well, as it happens, Kyle's broken it off with that horrible Frenchman."

She rolled her eyes. "Ah, yes, I'm sure it's just a matter of time now until he comes around and asks you to marry him, isn't it?"

I flinched. "That's hardly a nice thing to say. I'm just telling you what's been going on with us lately."

"There is nothing ever going on with you two, Stanley. Getting drunk off sherry and making fun of other people's problems aside, I'm sure he loves you, but he's a miserable man who wants very badly to always be miserable, and he will have to be dragged out of his misery kicking and screaming, you see."

"I don't know that you can really assess Kyle like that," I said drearily, knowing quite well she was correct. "He's not _your_ friend. You haven't sat up nights with him discussing his love life."

"No," she huffed. "I've been taking my temperature 60 times a day to try to predict when I am ovulating!"

This made me smile, as her prickly comments usually did, and I asked, mouth full of curried chicken, "Are you, now?"

"As it happens." She threw back her shoulders. "Can you tell? Do I look … rosier?"

"You look very fertile to me, Wends."

"Well, then maybe you can … say something to Lord Black, maybe, ask him to have a go at it."

"I concede to speak with Token about it," I conditioned, "if you soften your position on Kyle. He's everything to me, you know, simply everything."

She lowered her eyes to her teacup, just as she did when peeling back layers of self-protection to display her vulnerability all those years ago, confessing to a near-stranger about her recent termination. Then, she lifted them again, peering into me with the force of a desperate mother. "Am I nothing to you?" She managed to rasp this out fine enough, then she threw back her raven hair. "You've hardly been very fun lately, Stanley. Surely you must know that."

"It's not as if you've been a great party either!" I protested. "Look at us, sitting here eating sandwiches and whining."

"Fuck anyone new lately?" She asked this rather playfully, entirely because she knew I always answered.

"Oh, hardly. Just a lad from the club I took in the showers after a swim. Well, him, and that Asian bloke who hangs around with Craig" — I always made a point of sneering when I said 'Craig,' contracting my voice into a nasal tone of mockery — "you know, I think his name is Kevin."

"Don't know him," she confessed, now eagerly absorbed in fussing with her hair. "Hangs around with Craig, you say?"

"I don't know, for a rather high and mighty bloke, Craig keeps the spottiest company. I think I've seen him out with a real headcase lately, you know, some blond who I am very sure is coked up within and inch of his life."

"That boy." Wendy stiffened, sitting up straighter in recognition. "I don't know his name, but I know _him_, dear. He's been over with Craig before to have dinner with Token. I really think they just call him 'Tweek.' Ironically enough."

"Really!" I exclaimed. "How horrible! It's almost as if being called just 'Sodom' if one were gay or 'Fatty' if one were overweight."

"Well, Craig isn't very creative. He's really just something of a thug. I don't know how Token manages to stand him." I think Wendy knew as well as I did that how Token managed to stand Craig was that Craig brought his new boy over, and the three of them I'm sure took recreational drugs and copulated together. But no need to mention this to her; her day was obviously bad enough as it was.

One of many reasons Wendy and I got on so well was our ceaseless ability to perpetuate a conversation. Before either of us knew it, our talk had devolved into minutia and trivialities: I've eaten this, I've fancied that, so-and-so is quite a wanker, I think this new telly personality is a homo. You wouldn't think it from the grandiose room in which she took tea, but Token and Wendy owned a television, and she spent well enough time staring into the spangled void of the BBC, or rather, they both did. You may imagine they didn't, but Token and Wendy got on very well. Dare I say they were friends? Yes, I suppose they were. Even though their lives were on differing orbits, they still circled the same satellite, so to speak, living in the same home and (generally) sharing a bed. They breakfasted together and dined together and drank together, went out together, took holidays together. I suppose it was everything a marriage was meant to be, with the annoying exception of sexual attraction on the part of the husband. And yet, from time to the time they did have sex, particularly in what must have been their conceptual middle years, somewhere after their post-university wedding (which was covered quite extensively in the press) and prior to their respective fourth decades. Their union was half founded on the necessity of producing an heir, and half on the absurd idea of keeping up appearances. I believe it came down in many ways to Token's laziness. He could, after all, have periodically taken out a series of social- or class-climbing starlets and cast himself as a philanderer — but then, that would have involved careful calculation, or some kind of effort on his part, anyway, and certainly socialization with class-climbing starlets, and I somehow did not see Token as the type to enjoy that process. I suppose then, for him, 'married man' was a much better cover than the alternative.

I had lost track of the time, and how long I'd been gossip-mongering with Wendy. I told her a particularly long story about the boy I fucked at the club, to which she could only marvel, "It's swimming, dear; it always makes you so horny." I agreed, claiming it was the water sluicing between my thighs during laps that had an aphrodisiacal effect. "Of course, of course." She nodded along with my assessment, and I refrained from telling her that Kyle thought the same thing. Kyle was not a swimmer, not at all; he hated water, found it unnatural. Some questioning on the matter would easily reveal, I knew, that exposure to cleaning chemicals and the moisture of the post-swim steam and the air-drying effects of the locker room would force his hair to revert to its primitive state, gnarled and wild and uncontrollable. Certainly he would tolerate a sit in the hot tub, with his chin high above water, or at least covering nipples, where it was always easy enough to slip your hand into the crotch of a fellow next to you, provided he gave you a perverse nod when you tip-toed into the gurgling water. Perhaps, newly shorn and looking to be aroused past his melancholy, Kyle might take a swim with me? It was possible but improbable; Kyle preferred activities that barely exercised him, or did not cause him to sweat; I think working on his hair once a day was exhausting enough. I became mournful for a moment thinking of the loss of it, and I believe Wendy saw this in my eyes and she asked, "What are we moping about now?"

So I told her about Kyle's hair.

"Well." She grasped her teacup again. "I'll drink to that!"

This irked me. "His hair is really—"

She interrupted me. "Whatever you are going to say, Stanley, do not say it. This is a pyrrhic victory for me. It's been 20 years of listening to you go on about his damn head and whatever's growing on it. I'd think you were his barber."

"And it'll grow back," I concluded, grinned at her. "That's the beauty of it!"

"Yeah, okay." She shrugged, and lifted her eyes to some specter above my head. "Home so soon, dearest?"

She may have been talking to me in some dull metaphorical way, but very quickly I internalized a strong hand on my shoulder. Either Wendy had taken it up with some African lover whom she had a granted a set of keys, or the viscount had found his way, unexpectedly, to tea — he did not usually; he tended to spend his days away from the home in any manner of ways, brushing up on the policy he would so need when he took his seat later in life, or looking after business dealings, most of which sounded vague and unappreciable to me.

"Hello, Wendy." His voice contained some quirk of enthusiasm for her name — but, more for mine. "_Hello_, Stanley."

I rose — interpret freely. "Viscount," I said warmly, taking his hand. "What an unexpected delight."

"Yes, yes." Wendy pushed her chair back from the table, but did not get up. "Slow day out there?"

Token shrugged. "A bit, I suppose. But you told me you'd be having Stanley for tea, and I figured, why not come meet him?" He raised his eyebrows unenthusiastically. "It's been too long." I fought the temptation to say, curtly, "Well, no, dear, I definitely saw you out last Saturday, at Camp, and at the Bucky on Thursday, too." But this was not generally something I would say in front of one's wife.

He was wearing, as he always did, pitifully fitted trousers, so that it was entirely impossible to glean anything about the state of his arousal, or lack thereof, at the moment. I think that had been one of the appealing things about Token, as a boyfriend — I was never quite sure what he wanted, or when he wanted it. He had a very tight-lipped approach to everything, which perhaps was why he liked having someone to know his routines and be shocked when he broke them suited him just fine — excellently, in fact. I think he was in tune with my hasty downward glance, though, and he gave a curious, quick wink. For a moment, we gaped at each other, neither of us looking at the viscountess, trapped in sort of a staring game to see who would move a bit first, my mind racing with the idea that he'd come to see _me_; perhaps he wanted me to write something for him, but what could he possibly need written? No, that was ludicrous. I knew what he wanted. While we were performing this little formality, Wendy interrupted us.

"Pardon," she said stiffly, standing up as well. "I think you're trying to take my tea guest away from me, my lord."

"I'll be brief," Token assuaged her, rather ineffectively. I could see her nostrils flaring. She dropped her napkin on her seat, and tugged at the hem of her skirt.

Torn here between my friend and the opportunity to make up for my lost trip to the coffee shop earlier, I shook my head. I bit my lip. If it had been any other man's stifled beard, I don't believe I would have paused. "Well," I said, discreetly brushing away Token's hand as he tried to take me by the elbow. "I thought … I thought I was to speak with him." Her hands, hanging pathetically at her sides, clasped together tensely.

She swallowed, and fell back into her chair. "Don't be long."

"I shan't be." I blew her a kiss. "I never am."

She smiled at me wanly, and turned her head away.

XXX

Black House was like most stately, vaguely regal London residences of well-groomed lords and ladies: deceptively narrow on the outside, the slim façade of a townhouse, quite easily mistaken for smaller by American tourists who only ever saw these things on the New York streets — cases in which I found the proportions very immediate and revelatory; the length of the face of a house on those dirty little streets was the width of the interior, say. But the viscount and viscountess lived in a residence that opened up in many ways to a seemingly impossible breadth. The first two floors were very straightforward, very blatant, with large, showy chambers for reception, like the parlor overlooking the square in which Wendy usually held teas, and a formal dining room. Expectedly, the basement was for servants' quarters and the kitchen, and probably some storage. The house had been in the Williams family's possession since their receipt of the Viscount Black title, about a century back, possibly for service to the crown, or rather, probably for service to the crown, but I never asked, and never checked into it. Where people got their honors was an unfairly dubious premise to me, as I had and expected none. Nothing my father had that wasn't tangible enough to be shoved into my flat would expire with him, and they weren't things I wanted anyway: academic chairs, educational accomplishments, a CV swollen with publications and appointments. I suppose anyone assessing Randy Marsh based on these materials alone would see him as a distinguished geology scholar, and would never be fortunate to observe his wonderfully amusing-in-a-sick-way pathos, the drunken nights of fisticuffs at pubs, his somber disappointment in his only son, his baffling approval of his daughter's early departure from college to marry her art history lecturer. I saw the crown molding and ornate plasterwork lining the grand staircases of Black House, and sighed; I was fairly certain we were going up to Token's study, occupied by his father before him, and proceeding _him_, another three generations of noble heads of household. What was aggravating for him, I knew, was that the inheritance of this residence hinged on his ability to impregnate my friend. I shook it off noncommittally, resolving to speak with him about the matter before this meeting had concluded.

We reached the fifth floor, which featured a toilet, Token's study, and an adjoining library, cramming with some new and some very ancient books. I had thought he was taking me into his study, but he turned very suddenly at the top of the staircase instead of marching straight on into the office, bringing me into that book-full room with its built-in craftsmanship, supporting shelves and shelves of knowledge. There was a chair in the center of the room, with an ottoman, and I wondered about which far-back ancestor of Token's thought it was sufficient to put a single chair in here. Then again, I wasn't aware of any couples for whom reading was a particularly joint activity. It didn't matter. He crossed his arms, and leaned against a bookcase. "Well, my friend," he said in his clipped, warm tone. "You're looking well."

I rolled my eyes. "Oh, thanks. You too, I guess." I cleared my throat. "Did you … need something from me?" I cringed, inwardly. This was all so very awkward.

"Hmmm." He tugged me over by one of the button holes in my light blazer, which I didn't relish wearing in the warmer months but as I'd just come from handing in an assignment, I had been on my most professional alert. "She told me you were coming over for tea," he said wetly, wasting no time in undoing a couple of my shirt buttons. "I thought, what a lovely time to catch up."

"About that. I think we need to discuss something." Contradictorily, I wasted no time, opening the fly on his trousers as I spoke.

"What, pray tell, do we have to discuss?" After tugging the shirttails from my trousers, he began to unbuckle my belt.

"Wendy," I choked out, feeling his hand make contact — balls first, then cock. It was merely a brushing, as he slipped his hand out of my briefs nearly as soon as I'd mentioned Wendy's name, and cupped my chin with both hands, running a thumb against my jaw, both of us breathing very heavily, as one might only expect in this situation.

Following a very rough, very tense kiss, he spoke against my lips: "You know she knows, Stanley. We're hardly being illicit." His lips were on mine again, or rather, my bottom lip was between his, being sucked briefly, while I struggled to tug down his own knickers.

Extracting my lip from his jaw, I reminded him that I knew this, that it wasn't my gripe. He pushed me down by the shoulders, and I had to continue the rest of the conversation from underneath the outline of that streamlined, majestical stalk of his. Unlike other members, it was uniquely dark with indiscernible blushes of warm and cool contrasting colors, brought in by a really functional pump system, like the opposite of all colors at once. It was something I had always appreciated. I was hardly a particular size enthusiast, unlike multiple men I knew, who would very gladly get up off one cock and go sit down on another if the opportunity aroused itself, pun possibly intended. I would say this about Token's physical condition, and then resist from dwelling on it: I wouldn't allow myself to be penetrated by very many, but he was always on the short list of exceptions, so much I appreciated this tool. So I gave it a liberal licking, coating the thing with my own saliva, not really sure what kind of lubricant if any he had sitting around in the library of all places. I can't imagine anyone being bored by an extended description of this act, but Token was a fairly courteous type, proving that his breeding was good for something. He'd never forced me to take more than I could swallow, so to speak; he did not drill himself into my throat like any other party I was giving such allowances of dominance to would. As I worked on the head a great deal, I readily took note of the fluids gathering at the tip of his prick, the way the skin was curling back in anticipation. With a swift jerk to my own cock, about which I was feeling slightly neglected, he pulled me up by my armpits, so that I was leaning backward against the armchair.

"I know she forgives us," he said with compassion. I think I was intended to agree on this point, but the very truly throbbing head of his cock was circling around my entrance by this point, so I resigned myself to grunt a little affirmation, and almost hopped out of my trousers as I lifted my behind toward his crotch, finally feeling some weight off me as his wonderfully defined arms, the bulk of which I couldn't see at the moment but just knew was there, supported me from the top as I wrapped my legs around his torso. The effect was that my cock, which was doing nothing more than smearing anticipatory fluid all over his hard, dark abdominals, became trapped between us, which was something I rather enjoyed on the few occasions when I consented to allow myself to be buggered, to borrow an ironic term. I am quite sure that this was the exception ultimate between a man like myself and a man like Token: I was very allowing of deviations from the modus operandi, and he was not. I did not know him to have ever been fucked, or have his asshole penetrated in any sort of way. Even in the handful of lazy, excited months 15-odd years ago when we'd been in some formalized way together, he would not allow me near it. Fingers, lips, tongue, cock, _nothing_. Not even a jest about a carrot or something was acceptable. I think perhaps if he'd let himself get fucked by someone, even if it wasn't me, he might loosen up and see things a bit less rigidly. Even I could admit that a great deal of the enjoyment I took from fucking was the intimate knowledge of what it was to be fucked. Let's call it, say, a reverse appreciation.

He was a genial man, but a very stony, very silent lover, which was not to say that his attentions here were without any sort of passion, as that wasn't the case. He was quite loving about it, as I mentioned before, not interested in ripping or tearing or clawing at me. Certainly he didn't wish to hurt me, even if I was fairly tough and could take it. I did not generally perform penetration without lubrication, so he took his time, building his pace very slowly, working into me in steady, strong motions, not un-gentle. I spent this time slobbering on his neck, attempting to avoid wetting the pastel collar of his shirt, although I might not have bothered, considering my cock was slipping all over his belly under his shirt anyhow.

No matter how often I was fucked, which was to say not with any kind of regularity, I did not like to come with a man inside of me. This was one of those lessons I learned with the Token of our Oxford days; ejaculating mid-coitus left me softening and bored for the remainder of the act, wondering when he might get the idea that I was finished, and now it was becoming unenjoyable, or if not unenjoyable, simply frustrating, in an amusing sort of way. Typically, then, I used my hands to hold myself steady as best I could against the chair I was crushed up against instead of bringing myself off. So, when he finished, submerging himself into me for one last thrust — into my mouth as well, kissing me like he hadn't been kissing anyone for a while, which I imagined just couldn't be the case, if he was hanging around with Craig and all, never mind Wendy — we slipped down and he drew out of me. It was only at this moment that I realized he wasn't wearing a condom, and I reminded myself that maybe I should have asked. Back against the chair, he kissed me, supported me with one hand, and used the other to reach for my cock, which was by this point straining against my blazer painfully. I clenched my cheeks together, not really wanting his ejaculate to pour out and all over the extremely nice carpet. Wendy oversaw the cleaning staff, and I wasn't particularly interested in discussing it with her. But that just reminded me of Wendy again, so as soon as Token brought me off, as he was kissing around my jawline, I muttered, "You should be doing this with your lonely wife, dear," although I'm sure in my grogginess I slurred the 'dear.'

"Stanley." He sat back on his haunches, wiping his mouth. "Don't let's ruin a lovely mood."

"No, I'm serious." I hunched myself up enough to pull up my briefs and trousers, pleased that if I was going to leak, I could now do it somewhat guiltlessly. "It's not right," I grunted.

"Well." He stood up, and so did I, and he pulled up his pants before continuing. "I hardly see what's not right about it."

"Oh, don't you?" He shrugged. "You've got to give Wendy a child, my dear, and here you are wasting it on me."

He soured on this. "Don't tell me who I need to be giving children to," he scolded. "If you disagree so staunchly, why go along with it?"

"Well, screw it all! I'm no good at resisting seduction! And you know it."

"Not my problem." He shrugged again.

"No, don't you see? It is your problem! She's my friend, you know, I love her so. She needs a baby, obviously, and so do you, and time is running out … I feel. Why don't you gather your strength and give it another try?" I felt somewhat cad-like saying this with his semen trickling in the elastic leg-holes of my briefs, but at least I was back on-point now.

"If it's so damn easy, I think you should give her a damn baby." He backed up against one of the bookcases.

"I _think_ it would be readily apparent that it wasn't yours based on the coloring, my lord," was the best I could muster.

"Well, it's not quite so simple," he tried to explain. I think his cheeks were flushing; I could feel the warmth of his guilt creeping around his countenance, whereas it had already settled in mine. "I can't…" He sighed. "I used to be able to, and I just can't anymore."

"Well." I wasn't very sure what to say to this. Here I always assumed he was capable of providing the necessary service, and it seemed I'd been mistaken. "Well, that's bollocks. There might be another way. Hadn't you better speak with a physician? The breeding of England is of interest to someone in the medical community, I should wager."

That made him angriest of all the things I'd said. "Why don't you just leave?" he asked. He continued on with great sarcasm: "Go have tea with your friend. I think I should just sit here and contemplate each failure I've committed."

"It doesn't have to—"

"We're done, Stanley, thank you," he concluded, pointing toward the door. "I'll do my work now, and keep your words under advisement."

"I think you should!" I finished lamely. "Thanks for the fuck, dearest. I might have enjoyed it with a bit of lubrication. That, or elbow grease." He made a nasty gesture at me, and I made sure to shut the door.

On the way out, Wendy glowered at me. "Have fun?" she asked bitterly.

"Well," I stammered, unsure of how to ease this. "You know…"

"Oh, I know," she agreed. Then she put her head in her hands. I do not think she got up from the table the entire time I was away. I thought briefly for a moment about sitting back down, but did not. Just when I was thinking of quietly slipping out, she spoke again. "How could I be angry at you?" She lifted her head from her hands, but kept her eyes shut rubbing her temples. "You haven't betrayed me." She laughed briefly, and sighed. "I suppose I haven't been betrayed at all, really. That would imply I've had expectations broken, which I haven't. But! How instantly depressing that this is how I expect it to be?"

"Dearest." I walked back over to the table, and knelt beside her. I put my head in her lap. "I wish I hadn't, you know. I certainly don't _enjoy_ it with him, anymore. Which is not to imply we're doing it often, because I think that was really the first in quite some time."

Wendy stroked my mussed hair. "I think I have come to the conclusion, after all these years, that affluence breeds discontent which bleed idleness. Don't you think?"

"Maybe?" I raised my head. "I hope, for your sake, my dear, that you have some luck soon. I should hate to see you get on like this. Motherhood would become you, I feel."

"Thank you." We both stood up, and she brushed her skirt off. It was creased with lines that I'm sure had slowly formed over the hour or two she had sat at the table; I did not doubt it had been expertly pressed before tea. "I shall speak with him, I guess. It's just so … well, he's not bred for baring it all, anyway."

"Nor are you," I reminded her. "Nor am I."

"Well." She shrugged. "Let's do have tea again next week, dear."

"I'm sure we shall." I took one of her relatively soft, angular hands, and kissed her palm. "Until then, my lady."

Wendy swallowed. "Until then, Stanley."

XXX

I stopped for a drink at the Bucky on the way home. Was it on the way home, really? When one's time was all leisure, it seemed all things were on the way _somewhere_. In retrospect, it seemed that it had not _really_ been on the way, but I'd started off walking, which was usually the case, and found myself in the neighborhood, so I went in for a drink. On my way out of the pub, two whiskies later, a group of three American women asked me if it was a pub I had just been in, or a bordello.

"A pub," I assured them. Then, in my best faux-American tone of mockery, I added, "Gonna have some bangers and mash?" The insult was lost on them, and they found this hilarious.

"Oh, he's just precious!" one of them exclaimed.

Another asked if she could snap my photograph. "Pardon?" I asked, not really able to gage the surreality of this request. While I was trying to form a sentence that rightly captured the sentiments of "What the devil are you on about?" and "_No_," she took it anyway.

"I think this'll be worth something eventually," the photographer remarked. Her earrings were shaped like parrots. "The way things are going we won't have any left after a couple of years."

"Yeah," another agreed.

"_What_ are you talking about?" I asked, my recoil only halted for confusion.

The one with the parrot earrings looked at me, darkly, and said, "You be careful out there. There's a lot of icky stuff crawling around these days." Her companions nodded in agreement.

"Thank you, ladies." I sniffed. The summer air smelled like a mowed lawn and wet, heady dirt, the poisonous, trite perfume worn by the three middle-aged women crowding me, and cedar planks, for some reason. It was a very odd scent. Lately as I wandered around town I'd been detecting roses and ashes. But this was explainable, of course, because London was blooming, and this summer, the heat had proven its tendency to give way to fires. Perhaps Kyle was onto something, then, with his meditation (or obsession) on the escape routes from my flat.

XXX

I stopped at an off-license before returning home and, once there, began to drink in earnest. It had been a bit since I had been amazed by my ability to consume and consume and seemingly never feel the effects. In all honesty, I'd eaten a bit at tea, so those whiskies didn't go down on their own, and it was some time between departing the Bucky and arriving back at the flat, seeing as I first had to transfer at Bank, and then I'd stopped by the off-license. This was in addition to the tolerance issue. I knew I'd seen both my father and my uncle rather wasted on occasion, so I was sure it must be easier than not to become likewise inebriated. Surely they'd had to drink through a lot to get there. I suppose drinking for me was an activity, rather than means to a destination. I felt pretty poor at the moment, guilt over Wendy and fury at Token for being such a colossally lost cause. By my impending third cup I was royally annoyed and decided to eschew the glass entirely, so I slid it across the so-called coffee table with a sock-clad heel, and went straight into the bottle. Lest you think I was inclined to sit alone in my apartment drinking, please allow me to inform you that in fact I was sitting alone in my apartment drinking and reading Muriel Spark. I'd read these things over and over again, which felt rather wrong to me, but I enjoyed semi-contemporary work far more than the things I'd been nursed on, all that slop from Chaucer to Dickens, via Marlowe. Additionally, I steadfastly refused to read anything by an American, because it would only serve to remind me of the type I'd met back at the pub. At times I wondered if it wasn't the most fortunate blunder in British history to have ridden ourselves of that cursed little outpost of anti-intellectualism. But then, surely if they'd stuck with us, things would have turned out very differently; better for them, at least.

I hadn't realized I'd fallen asleep until I was being woken up. My stomach was sour, which I suppose was a given since I hadn't eaten since 5 and had since ingested an entire bottle plus two glasses of Glenfiddich. This, in combination with a ringing phone, got me groggily up, fumbling for the receiver, into which I barked, "What?" I was pretty irked, and then immediately humbled to learn that it was actually Kyle.

"I'm so sorry to wake you," he said immediately, recognizing my tiredness. "But I have a favor to ask."

"What's the time?" I asked. "Don't you tell me you haven't got a pocket watch, Kyle. I'm asleep."

He laughed nervously. "No, dear, there's a clock on the wall here. It's half-past 12."

"A clock on the wall _where_?" I asked, rubbing my eye as I woke up. My stomach wasn't settling.

"If you must know," he began. Then he interrupted himself to say, "Well, yes, I suppose you _must_ know, due to what I'll ask you. Do you mind picking me up, dear? I'm at old, um…" He trailed off subconsciously. "Clyde's," he finished.

"Pardon?"

"I'm at Clyde's, dear, Clyde's house. I know it is so terribly inconvenient, and I feel quite horrible asking, and I really did not mean to wake you, and you know I would never ask except in a bit of a bind, but…"

"Oh, Clyde's." This was beginning to register. "And you need me to pick you up, why? It's not like I've got an automobile or anything. I'm going to have to come on the Tube."

He sighed. "Well, dear — I know it is so _horribly_ terrible of me to have asked, but the thing is, the Underground's stopped running. It's past 12."

"Well." I was trying to think. Half of me wanted quite intensely to go save him, and yet the other half was feeling partly ill and cozy, although I should have put on pajamas before I fell asleep, or at least gotten in bed. Of course, that's what happens when one is sloppily drinking. Luckily I was still wearing trousers so rather than having to force my erected cock into confinement, it was already there, straining away, happy to be on the phone with Kyle at midnight even if I wasn't quite so thrilled. "Well," I finally managed. "Can't you simply stay there? Old Clyde must have a spare blanket."

"Ah, yes. Well, dear, you see, that's the thing. He's got the spare blanket, as he lives with his parents. I really have to leave, and it's so late and the Underground's over for the night, and I don't want to stand on the street wandering around looking for a cab. I might be brutalized or mugged or something."

"Well, where does our friend in question live?"

"Farringdon Road."

"_And what_, darling?"

"Rosebery, actually. It's somewhat on the way to King's Cross."

"Ah, all right. You just sit tight there, darling. I'm on my way."

"You are a lifesaver, Stanley!"

"Your life is hardly in danger, Kyle."

"Oh," he said noncommittally. "Anyway, I'll be looking out the window."

XXX

It was simple, really; I just took the bus. I got off at Clerkenwell and walked up the street. It was simple, really simple. My mind was on one track now; I had to get Kyle. He seemed grateful, and did not say goodnight to old Clyde. For that matter, old Clyde was absolutely nowhere. I was glad enough for this, because in truth speaking with old Clyde was on a short list of activities in which I disliked having to engage. We'd known him since school, as he'd been reading English with Garrison as well, so it had been a long time since we'd discovered he was about as boring as melba toast. He was our age, of course, but he readily earned the 'old' label by being about 50 in spirit if not in chronology when he went up. He was a laborious scholar, but rather dim and lacking any confidence. I imagine he'd earned his place as his father was also in the geology department, although what he researched or taught I had no idea, and it hardly mattered since the old man was retired now, I knew from my father. I know his family was a bit well off, owing their state of finance to the ownership of a shoe store, I think. Still, he was a bore, a whiney, awful bore. But, apparently, a bore with a gratuitously sized donger, which Kyle was gleefully telling me about, painting majestical linguistical descriptions of how vivid the purple of his swollen cockhead was the first time Kyle pushed his skin back. "Almost like the _Wizard of Oz_, you know," he was excitedly telling me. "All that fleshy dullness, and then all that outrageous violet! Like a blacklight being lit or something!"

"Fabulous." He was leaning on my shoulder, and I was leaning against the door in the backseat of a black taxi cab. We were on the way back to his flat, which I'd requested specifically, thinking the sight of Spark and an empty whisky bottle would just upset me upon returning to mine. "Tell me again why old Clyde was so unable to get you a cab?"

Kyle sniffled into my shoulder. He'd been so sniffly lately. I am pretty certain he was congested, however. "Well, he's asleep." I raised my eyebrows. "I know, dear. Well, no one's as considerate a lover as you. He has the most remarkable stamina, but as soon as he comes he just falls right to sleep. He's so unappealing when he sleeps, too. He sleeps with his mouth open and he snores like a lorry engine. Frankly, I can't stand it, and if I hadn't brought myself off while he was still drilling me it might have killed my erection."

"Indeed." Jealous as I was, this unflattering assessment of old Clyde was amusing enough. "You had no idea he lived with his parents."

"None!"

"One thinks that would have come up the first time you, um…" I just shrugged in conclusion to that thought.

"Yeah, well." Kyle rubbed his nose. "That was all in the bushes."

"Golly." I sighed. "The Mall is pretty at night, don't you think?"

"Mmmm." There was a moment of silence before Kyle decided to tell me, "You know, I spoke to Miss B this morning."

"Oh, okay." I waited for him to elaborate, but he didn't. "So, how is she?"

"She's fine, quite fine." This was all a ridiculous conversation to be having, considering I'd just seen Butters out last Saturday.

"Thinks we should go out on Saturday," Kyle kept nattering. He wasn't tired at all, which was awkward, because I was slightly intoxicated and somewhat tired and altogether a bit ill, too. Additionally, my calendar was always open on Saturday nights, at least since I'd sworn off any kind of formal courting. To think, just about every Saturday night we went out to Camp, and every week Butters was precarious about it, calling Kyle to ask if we were going to go, possibly afraid of missing out one week.

"She says Eric's got some _thing_ to show us." It was amazing to me that Kyle was still going, and that he was telling me this now, when I was incredibly unlikely to remember any of it. "Some shocking thing, or something."

"Yeah," I agreed half-heartedly, staring out the window with my hand on Kyle's knee. "Sure he does. Totally shocking."

"Thank you for rescuing me, dear," was the last thing he said during the car ride. "I don't know why I keep doing this to myself."

"Of course, darling." I moved my hand up his leg and squeezed his thigh in reassurance.


	2. Chapter 2

Hello again! If you've bothered clicking on this chapter, thank you so much! I'm still pretty nervous about this story, so I really appreciate that you're still reading it. I'm thinking it will be about 10 chapters, but nothing is definite yet. Still, things are coming together. I hope you're excited, because I'm excited. I would also like to thank the amazing **Foodstamp** for beta-reading this for me, especially considering I delayed posting this for a week after I asked her to get it back to me. But it's here now, and that's what matters, right?

Enjoy!

* * *

When we were in our second year, Kyle and I developed the idea that conflating nearly every queer we came across at school with feminine pronouns was not merely hilarious, but an ingenious sort of pseudo-ironic social commentary on our ever-expanding network of contacts, most of whom were sexual. Soon enough, everyone was a she.

We developed this even farther, sorting our acquaintances, friends, and lovers into full-on power groups within this insidious little nomenclature:

1. If we judged a lad effeminate, or he bottomed during sex, or we found him impractically risible in any sort of masculine role, it was 'Miss' for him, and if we were overly familiar with him he'd be reduced to 'Miss' and his first initial.

2. Sticklers, or ballsy-macho sportsmen, or those known to top, or anyone closeted, we dubbed 'Madame,' and again with the first initial.

I think, in the 1960s, sophomoric as we were — which is to say, incredibly — this felt very inventive and edgy for us. We thought it so cruel that the first time Garrison caught us doing it, he scoffed at us and told us we were rather unoriginal.

"It's been done, boys," I remember him saying, arms crossed. "Why don't you stupid lads get over yourselves already?" He was never a very nice man, so it's not as if we were shocked that he was cruel. We just missed our joke, and thinking of ourselves as original. "You might as well wear signet rings on your pinkies and paint your nails," he added. "I mean, for crying out loud."

We actually knew of one lad who did paint his nails, and one who wore a signet ring on his pinky. The former was Butters; the latter, Eric. I suppose they were our friends, but then again, so much of who your mates are depends on how you define the term, no? Is it about the quantity of time you spend with them, or the quality of that time? The nature of that time? The fact that you all went up and down together?

There was a time in my life when I hadn't known Kyle, but that time seemed distant and empty in comparison. I did not think that there was a single chance in all of temporality that we might not have been close. With his exception, I was sure that the rest of these people I called 'friends' would not have been such if the circumstances had been different. You see, I did not really like Butters and Eric. We studied together at school, and had similar sexual proclivities, and lived in the same city now, and frequented the same clubs and pubs, bathhouses and gyms. We wandered the Soho streets and London parks together, cruising one another, forming visceral bonds with each other, although not so much lately. I think it is safe to say that my affection for them, such as it was, was based entirely on our having been queer together in the same course at school. Well, that, and the four of us had the same aversions.

Saturday nights began for us at Kyle's flat. It was hardly convenient, but Kyle insisted we begin there at 8 on the dot for drinks and hors d'oeuvres. Tonight it was poached salmon and crème fraiche on blini, and individual pies. Unfortunately, they were shepherd's pies, with ground lamb inside tossed together with cubed chunks of carrot and peas, topped by mash and served in heavy ceramic ramekins. To drink, he was chilling three bottles of cava and had lined up three crystal flutes. Kyle's stemware always looked lovely on his gleaming black marble counters, light-catching and dear-looking at they were. He worked in an industry in which gorgeous things were handed to him all the time. The champagne flutes, I'm sure, were a gift from Baccarat or Lalique, a thanks for pitching their products to other ignorant nouveau-riche faggots who wanted to drink on Saturday nights before going out.

I have very little ability to characterize Kyle's cooking. To be fair about it, I'm not sure it was cooking at all, but food preparation, as might be apparent when you consider the case of the salmon blini. I suppose he might have poached the fish himself, but it was far more likely that he went to Fortnum & Mason after work and bought everything served here. I could see him, in his fussy little way, fumbling into the lift with a bag of plastic containers, removing them one by one to the counter, dumping the contents into various pieces of china, or a cast-iron skillet. Kyle heated everything in a cast-iron skillet. This was one of several skills he picked up from his mother, and I don't know if it was a particularly American trait to cook things in an iron skillet, but he loved grease; loved watching it congeal in an empty, cooling pan. I knew he would have bitten his thick lower lip while he prepared everything, wondering if he had enough ice for the cava.

The problem with this scenario was that pies in the oven reminded me of miserable lunchtimes at my mother's house, my nieces and nephews tugging at her skirt while she hacked onions. "Be a dear, Stanley, and take them to the park, will you?" I can hear her asking in my mind. In the same irrelevant way that speaking to Wendy on the telephone reminded me of Kyle masturbating, Kyle serving pies reminded me of my family. Horrible. I don't know if it was this or the fact that I'd eaten a bacon avocado sandwich after rather rough, dry sex with a faceless bloke in the sauna after my swim that afternoon, but I wasn't so hungry at the moment.

On the other hand, Miss B was content to eat blini after blini. Kyle was the type to make 30 blini for three of us, and carefully recommend after setting down the silver platter that we each have 10. "Oh, I'm not so hungry," I said genially at this calculation. "I think I'll just have one." This made Kyle raise his eyebrows, because he was very annoyed by the prospect that, as it now stood, there were 29 blini for two of them, which wasn't going to come out to a fair division. So I conceded, "Well, all right. It won't hurt me to eat _two_."

"So, 14 for each of us," Kyle said wistfully, edging a glass plate toward Butters. "I hope you'll eat your share, ducks. They don't keep well. And I've been meaning to watch my calories this week!"

"This is lovely, fellows," Butters said. "I can't imagine a nicer Saturday evening."

"You haven't got a very well-developed imagination then, have you?" I asked. "Because we do this every Saturday evening."

"But there isn't always blini," Butters insisted.

"Well, so last week it was stilton and apple tarts" — which I knew Kyle had just bought wholesale from some pastry shop, but felt inclined to mention anyway, like this was all some great credit to his hostessing skills — "this week, blini. I mean, really, Butters, don't be so impressed."

Kyle proffered me a glass of cava. "I think I'd prefer it if you let him remain impressed."

"Well, it's lovely, all so lovely," Butters complimented as I sipped my drink. Kyle handed him a drink as well, and he merely held it as he blathered rather inconsequentially about his horribly boring week. We'd last seen him the previous Saturday night, unsuccessfully flirting in the hallway that led to the backrooms at Camp with an impeccably dressed older fellow who looked about 40, maybe 50, wool-crepe suit in late June, which usually meant money, although more and more frequently these days it seemed to suggest 'drug addict.' That said, Butters was a rather responsible fellow who could take very good care of himself, and I am sure that he struck out with whomever he was attempting to get into the pants of, and took a bus back home to Southwark, where he worked in an antiquarian bookshop. He probably spent Sunday reading the papers and walking his bulldog, making sure to be home and in front of the telly in time for the nightly film on ITV. Perhaps he went to some local pub and had a Sunday dinner, or perhaps in an even sadder turn of events he made one himself. I could see him very carefully breaking up a frozen block of peas over a … cast iron skillet. Well, now I could only think of cast iron skillets, which was annoying, since I'm not altogether certain Butters had the upper-body strength to lift one.

The first thing we did was toast to our health, which was amusingly punctuated by Kyle sneezing into his sleeve, nearly avoiding a cava spillage on his cotton T-shirt. After wiping his lips, Kyle very casually asked Butters about the notable absence of Eric. "He'll meet us at the club, you see," Butters explained hastily. "He's preoccupied."

"With what?" Kyle asked nastily. "Cramming Jammie Dodgers into his craw?"

I laughed at this, despite the pedantic nature of the comment. Butters just sighed and rolled his eyes in a put-upon way, muttering something about it not being nice.

"Well, I made him a pie," Kyle continued. "In fact, I thought I should have made him six pies. But I suppose he's too important to show his face in my flat after last week." Last week being when Eric had gotten into a screaming argument with Christophe about nationalized healthcare. "Oh, cripes. You lads don't think it's why Christophe left me, do you? Isn't it possible Eric chased him off? I mean, it was only shortly thereafter—"

"Oh, no." Butters was very quick in these situations. "I hardly think he was judging the company you keep, or anything. Seems to me he just wasn't a very nice sort of bloke, was he? I mean, he's nothing more than a petty thief, is he?"

"Who are we talking about here?" I asked, knowing perfectly well who it was we were discussing. "Eric, or Christophe?"

The stress of this conversation drove Kyle to eat Eric's pie in addition to his own. He washed each bite down with cava, managing to finish about a bottle on his own. Everything Kyle did was fascinating to me after a few flutes of champagne. "It's good he's not here anyway," he said after scraping the burnt mash from under the lip of the ramekin so he could eat it. "That man will only drink fermented bilge. And I think should have gone with a moscato."

"It's all just champagne, anyway," I advised.

"It's just so political, the geography of alcohol." Kyle drank even more cava to facilitate his next thought: "Anyway, champagne is French, obviously, so I won't be drinking that for quite some time."

"You can't just avoid everything French altogether," Butters noted. "It's a fairly prevalent culture, don't you think?"

"Yes, with a fairly prevalent population of two-timing arseholes."

Butters may have been correct, of course, but he did not know that Kyle's determination was like an iron girder — impossible to bend. Kyle would turn up his nose at torchon de foie gras and destroy his LP of the _Les Mis_ soundtrack, take his beloved picture book about Poiret off the coffee table and donate his Givenchy waistcoat to Oxfam; I'm sure they would be glad to get it. Butters did not have my perspective on these things. He could not have known how deeply Kyle was wounded or how his scars would never heal.

"Well, I am terribly sorry it all went to rubbish so soon," Butters was saying, patting Kyle on the back timidly, the way Butters did all things.

"So am I." Kyle rolled his champagne flute between his palms. "So am I."

"I suppose you're holding up all right, though."

Kyle stopped fiddling with his glass and put it down. "My mother says I am 'eating my feelings,' whatever that is supposed to mean. The implication, I am sure, is that when I was with Christophe I was starving my feelings, maybe. I don't know what that _was_, really. Perhaps it was some sick concentration camp trope, like a pantomime of _la resistance_, or something similar. The point, I believe, is that she really wishes I'd fatten up, and hates seeing me skinny. I hate seeing me skinny, too, although I hate seeing me plump as well. But above all else, I hate seeing myself dumped." He put his head on the counter, nested in his arms. "Nobody loves me," he whined. (His proletariat inflection had a very Eastern Seaboard wash on it; very many things he said sounded like whining, upset or not.)

I decided it was high time I spoke up. "Oh, it isn't true," I offered. I came around behind him and set my champagne flute on the counter so I could stroke his hair. "You are quite loved, darling. Think of your family."

"They haven't got a choice."

"But think of all the poor souls who have no family, or whose family can't be counted on."

"It's not what I mean." Kyle shifted his weight, transferring the burden of his hunched body from his left leg to his right.

"Well, I love you." From below, I felt him heave a sigh. "Butters loves you. Isn't that right, Miss B?"

" 'Course it is!" Butters cheered.

Kyle raised his head and wiped his eyes. "Thanks for the pity, lads." One bottle of cava was left on the counter, about half-finished. He snatched it by its neck and looked at it squeamishly for a moment before clenching his other fist and declaring, "I've got to get dressed! We can't have me going out dressed like some old slob, can we?"

"I think you look lovely," Butters said kindly. He inched an empty ramekin away and picked up a blini.

Kyle looked to me, pursing his lips and tilting his head as if a toddler in deep thought. "Stanley?" he asked weakly, tugging on the hem of his shirt. "Thoughts?"

I shrugged, and crossed my arms. "Wear what you like," I said amiably. "Everything suits you." Except the dull, staid things he wore to work, I felt. Even if they were not particularly slack, his work trousers did not flatter his assets like a well-worn, well-loved pair of blue jeans, or the forest green corduroys he stomped around in every so often at school, which cleaved his behind in two perfectly symmetrical globes.

"Well, I'm off to change, then," he said with a sigh. "There's more cava in the pantry, if either of you must, but it's hardly chilled, so I'd stick it in the freezer for 10 minutes before I put it on ice."

XXX

Butters got a fourth bottle of cava out of the pantry, and I stuck it in the freezer. He was possibly one of the dullest faggots I'd ever met in my life, surpassed only by old Clyde in sheer capability to induce ennui in persons long-known and recently acquainted. Butters looked like a heterosexual nowadays, which perhaps contributed to his lack of activity in the bedroom. He was the only one of us at school to have gone up in a relationship, and gone down in a relationship. In fact, it was the same relationship. Butters did not like to discuss the details, but his father — a distant authoritarian figure who treated his son as if they were both ironic characters in Dickens instead of citizens of the modern era — had shipped him off to a correctional facility when he found his 12-year-old son pleasuring himself to dirty pictures of men, naturally. (On the rare occasion that Butters decided to tell the story, he made sure to include the part about how he'd found these pictures in the top drawer of his old man's desk.)

While in rehabilitation, as he'd coyly refer to it, he fell passionately in love with a boy named Bradley, and six years later when I met him at the English course mixer three weeks into our academic careers, he had Bradley in tow, gushing about their long years of claims of devotion laid out in flowing blue-back fountain ink on onion-skin stationery. It was a bit too twee for my liking, and I never found Bradley particularly attractive, with his pile of straw-colored curls and revolting habit of chewing his nails down to bloody nubs. Once I wore a pair of white trousers to an end-of-term dinner, and in an attempt to be funny, which it was _not_, he left a trail of bloody streaks on the seat of my slacks when spanking my arse. I loathed him from there on out, having ruined my favorite pair of trousers twice, once by bloodying them and once by causing me to jump into Craig — whom I was regrettably standing next to — who happened to be holding an over-filled glass of cabernet. Butters and Bradley both apologized profusely, offering to bleach my trousers or send my trousers out to be laundered, or to purchase me a new pair of trousers. Sadly for them, the damage was done, and I had to wear something less flattering to my end-of-term date with a delicious first-year whom I'd first seen in a local run of _West Side Story_. Craig was livid, as the jolt had caused some wine to spill on his grandfather's precious Saville Row suit (as if his damn grandfather didn't own about 60 Saville Row suits). He was furious, and spent the remainder of the dinner hollering at me anyway, despite my attempt to explain that it was Bradley who was to blame. I _really_ disliked Bradley from that day on, which was what made it quite awkward to get the call from Butters six years ago that Bradley had been strangled to death outside of their home while fighting off some hooligans. It was implied, but never directly revealed to me, that the crime was related to his sexual proclivities in some way.

Butters was miserable, of course, but he'd gotten over it. The perpetrators were never discovered, and the local law enforcement eventually wrote it off as 'neighborhood violence.' One might think that having come to Oxford in a relationship and having left in one, he'd never had sex with another man in his life, but that just wasn't the case. We'd all had him, which was in fact the genesis of his nickname; his bowels, we boys found, were a joy to delve into, veritably as smooth as … well, you know. Thus Leopold Stotch became Butters. The moniker stuck, and to this day the only human being I'd ever heard call him by his Christian name was Bradley. At bars, at Camp, whilst cottaging, he could only bear to introduce himself as Butters. Indeed, back when his most compelling outlet had been female impersonation, the name 'Butters Stotch' suited the bill quite nicely. (He alternated this with the significantly less clever 'Marjorine Faithfull.')

After the death of his lover you'd expect him to begin having more sex, or at least sex with a greater variety of persons, but that also wasn't the case. Butters was a rather chunky 36 now with a double chin and a hairline receding quicker than the ozone layer. He was quite friendly and yet so pathetically boring, which was what made sitting alone with him in Kyle's flat particularly torturous. If the four of us had not been so cruelly blackballed together throughout school, I doubt I'd ever have spent time with him.

Thinking of questions to ask him was about as grueling as pretending to be interested in the mechanics of geological study, or the intimate details of one of my sister's pregnancies. In the case of Butters and his bookshop, I did my best to play along as he spoke about the antique books market, but at a certain point it all became too much and my eyes began to glaze over in frustration. To appear interested, I had to make a few concentrated inquiries. "Well, there can't be too many of _those_, can there?" I forced myself to ask about a first edition of _The Hobbit_.

"Oh, you'd be surprised what people hang onto, what they bring into the shop," he reassured me.

"And why would someone want to get rid of a first-edition of _anything_?"

"Oh." Butters coughed into his hands. "Excuse me. We haven't all got the storage space _you've _got. Books are deceptively bulky."

I had the feeling I was meant to be insulted by this. "I have a fair share of books, you know!" I replied. "I didn't take an English course because I hardly read at all."

"No," Butters agreed. "But, as I said, you inhabit a great, big, cavernous space — a virtual library, for what it's worth. I should only wish to hang onto all the books you've got. Then again, I don't think you've got a first-edition _Hobbit_ lying around."

"No," I agreed. "But what a dreary thing to have sitting around the flat, am I right?"

"Oh, no, it's uniquely fascinating." If there was anything I could believe about Butters, it was the sincerity of his words. I am certain, for example, that he _did_ find first editions of Tolkien luxuriantly fascinating. "Did you know that the initial edition of _The Hobbit_'s all wrong?"

"No," I confessed. "In what way is it wrong?"

"Well!" Butters was glowing, obviously looking to regale me with this story. "You know, of course, that an early moment in the novel is Bilbo's encounter with Gollum, which results in Bilbo's acquiring his adversary's magic ring."

"Of course," I agreed. "That is, in essence, the point of the book."

"Oh, but it isn't! You see, at the composition of _The Hobbit_, Tolkien really hadn't thought of a way to connect the tale to his greater mythology. He wouldn't, of course, until his publisher asked for a sequel to _The Hobbit_, develop the larger idea that the ring was truly _the_ Ring, capital R, and all that business with Sauron and so on. Of course, you know all about that, as you read it in _The Lord of Rings_." In fact, not only had I read _Lord of the Rings_, but I had steadfastly hated it. (Tangentially: In our undergraduate days, it was not unusual to see Professor Tolkien wandering around town, popping into the pub or a library, or on his way to see an old colleague.)

"I'm sorry," I said rudely, setting down my empty champagne flute. "I have no idea how we got onto this topic."

"The point I am making," Butters began, somewhat exasperated, "is that in the first edition of _The Hobbit_, the encounter with Gollum is different, as the one we are all so familiar with is actually a revision by Tolkien after he composed _Lord of the Rings_ and decided that the ring was not merely a magical deus ex machina but the ultimate sentient evil wedding band."

"Tremendous, Butters. Tremendous. Will you excuse me for a moment?"

"Of course," he said, and I slipped out of the parlor and made my way to Kyle's bedroom, which was down a hallway with a crimson runner and ornate crown molding. There were a few doors here, which led to a guest lavatory, a guest bedroom, an office, a washing room — Kyle had a very nice flat, which was easy to forget because he was so naturally at home in my flat, which I rather liked but wouldn't venture so far as to call 'nice.' At best, perhaps, it was homey. I rather enjoyed it, in any case.

The streamlined fussiness of Kyle's habitat seemed contradictory — very traditionally showy, and yet carefully set up that way. I suppose to fully understand, one might have to be familiar with Kyle's thought process. He loved designating responsibilities to other people, yet he hated intruders. He loved entertaining, yet he would so much rather be entertained. He relied on me to escort him from one adventure to the next, if one could call these things adventures. After I'd ended things with Gary, and was feeling rather down about it, we'd gone to Thailand. In short, the trip was like this: Kyle was uncomfortable in the very muggy weather, and did not like noodles very much, at least not at every meal. I did not enjoy drinking sickeningly sweet things, so various alcohols mixed with various nectars didn't really please me. We spent several days completely trashed on the narcotics we'd brought with us, having copious amounts of inebriated sex. After we ventured out of the hotel, we spent the second to last day seducing underage locals (in my case) or bored fellow tourists (Kyle's) until we were so fucked out we could barely stand. We spent the last day sleeping, and I brought each of my sister's children back an embroidered silk wallet, which cost me about half a quid apiece.

I gently rapped on the double-doors to Kyle's bedroom, and he bid me enter. I didn't know what was taking so bloody long, but when I got inside I realized that he was sitting at his vanity with his head in his hands again, looking very miserable despite the fact he was dressed to the nines in a pleasingly tight pair of denim trousers that rode absurdly low.

"You slut," I said, slipping a hand down his slacks, making sure to let one finger run down his pronounced crack. "These slacks are so obscene it should be illegal."

He raised his head. "Are they? I surely wouldn't want it to be too obvious that I'm on the prowl."

"Oh." I took my hand out of his pants and stuck it in my pocket. "Are you, now?"

He sighed, and got up to face me, crossing his arms over his chest. He was wearing a very nice green sweater, with a draping collar, but for some reason it was apparently too short to cover his arse. Kyle had not always been a good dresser, but he had come over the years to develop his own style, which I found interesting and titillating, or perhaps it was merely the idea of fabric gently brushing against his skin that intrigued me. "I suppose I am going to forever be on the prowl," he said sadly. "It's just a fact of life, isn't it? We become romantically aware of ourselves and the people around us, and then we proceed to spend the duration of our lives groping around in the dark for something or someone, in most cases someone, to fulfill this unspeakable need that can barely be described. Do you know what I mean?"

He looked across at me, his green-brown eyes steady, studying my face. I thought he might be looking at my lips. I knew what he meant, and yet I did not — I was no longer looking for someone; in fact, I'd found him, and he was standing across from me, and I could see a strip of flesh between the top of his trousers and the hem of his sweater reflected in the vanity. (For the record, Kyle was not so gay as to purposefully go out and purchase a vanity. He was, however, gay enough to use the vanity that had come built into the woodwork in his bedroom.) The issue for me was that of all the men I had made a very earnest attempt at partially domesticated normalcy with, none had lived up to the standards by which I envisioned Kyle to live. Knowing this, it was hard to be honest with him. I was hardly about to say, 'Yes, darling, you are my unattainable; won't you come move into my flat with me? I am the fulfillment you've been waiting for.' So instead, I cautiously said, "I do."

"I do too." He shook his head remorsefully. "I do too." After grabbing a tissue, he blew his nose, and then said, "I'm sorry, I've been off contemplating what it will be like to spend the duration of my life in self-loathing. Did you need something? All this solitary misery must seem terribly rude."

"Oh, no," I said. "I'm well. I just couldn't stand to spend another moment with Miss B, listening to her go on and on about old books."

"Why, sweetheart, I thought you adored old books."

"And maybe I do, but there are few less interesting things in life than speaking about them with a fussy sort of widow who deals in these things for a living."

"That's a wonderfully cruel thing to say, Stan Marsh!" Kyle sat back down at his vanity, mouth open in exasperation as he dug around a drawer, not pausing until he uncovered a pair of tweezers. "She might be drier than _Out of the Silent Planet_, on the outside, but she's got a sweet spirit that I readily admire. And don't you call her a widow!"

"Well, what can I say? I'm low on sympathy tonight."

Kyle grunted, frowning as he plucked his eyebrows. "I should have done this before you both came over," he admitted. "I'm just running so late." With a groan, he dropped the tweezers, and turned around to face me. "What do you think?" he asked. "Too heavy-handed?"

"I thought you looked fine before."

"Well, thanks. As much as I appreciate your company while I dress, though, I find it terribly rude of _you_ to have left poor old Miss B just sitting there to rifle through my Poiret tome."

"Yeah, well, she can handle herself."

"I don't know how you can be so pitiless."

"Well, she seems just fine," I insisted. "I mean, we all lose people. You just lost Christophe."

"Christophe may no longer be sharing my bed and soiling my linens," Kyle began, nodding toward the bed for emphasis, "but he is _alive_, which means he is likely milling about somewhere. He will continue to frequent the same spots I do, and he's clearly comfortable with that nasty radical MP I mentioned earlier. You know the one, Gregory?"

"I have never met him," I confessed.

"Well, you know _of_ him. I asked my mother to do some checking, yeah? You know, or tell me what she knew about him? Well, turns out he's been holding up some censorship bills of hers, making little dreadful speeches about fairness and all that."

"Who is he kidding?"

"Not my mother, that's for sure! He sounds like a complete bastard. In any scenario, my point about him is this: If I ever _want_ Christophe for some reason, if only to gaze upon him, all I have to do is go down to the pub, or track down Gregory and make an inquiry. I should hardly commit to describing how I felt about Chris at the time we were cohabitating, because I certainly did not love him. I've loved once, and frankly, the endless search to reproduce it has been exhausting."

For a moment, I paused. I'd never heard him say he'd loved anyone before, or to have singled the matter out so readily. I wasn't sure to whom he could have been referring, as there would have been several pretenders. Craig? Eric? He'd just said it wasn't Christophe. I badly wanted to know, and yet thinking about it was exhausting and disappointing. He was still babbling on about it, but I wasn't paying very close attention.

"Kyle," I interrupted. "The point?"

"Oh, the point. Let's not forget _that_. The point, dear, is that as many times as I've had my heart broken, all of these men are still very viable, do you know what I mean? I believe I could have them again, if I liked." He looked very sad. "But Butters," he said in a hushed voice. The cross of his arms seemed like it had suddenly gone from stern to protective. "Well, he's at quite a loss. He wasn't _left_, not the way I've been left."

"Or I've been left," I reminded him.

"Sure, or that. You know, she was more like … abandoned. In a very real way." Kyle paused dramatically one last time, and then concluded in a very breathy way, "_Forever_."

"Seems like a long time."

"Well, do you ever think she might meet someone again?"

"I don't know, darling. I'm not in the business of projecting her love life."

"Well, let's try to help, if we can. Oh, right." Kyle glanced behind himself and noticed his keys on the vanity, picked them up and made a protective fist around them. "These'll come in handy if I need to get back in here."

"Planning on abandoning the flat?" I asked.

"Well, no, of course not." He slipped his keys into his front pocket. "But I try to keep alive the possibility of going home with someone else entirely." He was about to shut off the vanity light when he paused, and said to me, "Please say you'll do me a favor."

"Anything, darling."

He breathed deeply as a preface. "If I run into old Clyde, please don't let him have me again."

I obviously scowled, and he saw this and amended his request.

"Oh, all right, I suppose I should rephrase that. Please don't let me do anything more with him. Everything but the meager two minutes of thrusting he can manage is so severely draining. I simply don't want to do it."

I had to think of something to say. "And here I thought you were enthusiastic about the whole thing."

"Well, it's his cock, dear," Kyle explained. "It's a beautiful specimen, and there's something savory and nasty about it, something I can appreciate. But it's him, you know, I cannot stand him." With a rarely seen humility, he clasped his hands. "So, please, dearest, I am begging you. I cannot let my self-esteem drop any lower than it already has this week."

"Well, certainly," I said. Inwardly I felt numb, not quite sure of how I should feel about it. On the one hand, it was wonderful that Kyle hated old Clyde about as much as I did at the moment. On the other, his admitted compulsion to saddle himself in other men's laps would always be disturbing to me.

"Thank you, Stanley. You are consistently my savior."

After that, he turned off the vanity lights. We collected Butters, and caught a cab.

XXX

Perhaps a month after I had met Wendy, we were having tea with some regularity. It seems at university one's time is all leisure, and I was enjoying her friendship to the hilt. Her bitter melancholy was amusing, and we seemed to share musical leanings, at least more so than Kyle and I did. Wendy had theatrical taste at the time, delighting in the choral voices of 50 young men on high and imposing organ chords pulsing through her high-end speaker system. Likewise, she found the minimalist twangs of the so-called Mod sound intriguing. Wendy was quite sleekly Mod herself around age 20, sporting opaque tights and short dresses with broad collars of bold, thick fabrics. We made quite a pair, walking along the river arm-in-arm, her with her knee-high scuffed boots and me with my sickening peroxide-bleached hair with creeping black roots. She liked to joke that my hair was nearly as long as hers, which swung around the small of her back wildly when she moved even slightly. Actually, my hair was not quite _that _long; it seemed to hover around my ears, although sometimes I became lazy or felt particularly glamorous and let it get down to my chin before I let Kyle cut it for me. At the time, Kyle's own hair was a big red shrub, henna-ed imperceptibly and teased to abnormally excessive heights and shapes. In the post-modern world, this sort of hair might only be perceived as artistic, but in staid Oxford at the time, it was a direct marker of deviant sexuality. In fact, it was when my father first saw me after I'd bleached my hair that he realized that I was gay. He was livid, and as he was with a colleague at the time, entirely humiliated. I am sure he had half a mind to beat me, but my mother, with her persuasive powers of diffusion, talked him out of it, and it took only a year and a half or so of this for both Kyle and me to grow out of it and return to hair of a less outrageous nature. The damage was done, though.

It was the Wendy of these formative years who introduced me to Eric Cartman. I suppose I should feel less guilt at having been responsible for getting her in with Token, because every time I met up with Eric I remembered that she had introduced him, in all of his destructive bad nature, to my life. I can see her with her fairytale hair and very blunt bangs pouring me a cup of tea over a dainty screen, the clumps of leaves catching as she told me very straightly about her friend Eric, whom she'd met in her French course, as they were working with the same tutor, a funny man named Mackey with a risible verbal quirk she made fun of on occasion.

"The problem, Stanley," I recall her saying, setting the pot back down, "is that Eric's not a true scholar. He's a rower, you see, and I think foreign languages are just out of his grasp."

"That's really a shame for him, then," I said after I sipped an Irish breakfast.

"Yes, well. He's on the chopping block, I'm afraid, and he'll be asked to go down if he doesn't find another course."

I blinked. "So?"

"So, I may have told him about you, and that your father held a professorship in the geology department. And … well, I may have implied that you'd be able to get him into a geology course."

I demanded to know why she thought I'd do this.

"He's a great friend," she claimed. "It would mean so much to me. I just … well, let us suffice to say that I owe him a great deal." Little did I know that as far as Eric Cartman was concerned, everyone owed him a great deal. I was not in the habit of pressing her, so I did not beg for more information on why exactly she felt she owed Eric Cartman anything. As I was about to discover, he was a petty bully.

The very moment he looked at me, with my straw-colored hair and pastel-colored pants, he immediately burst out laughing. "Wendy was correct about you, all right!"

"And just what the bloody hell is that supposed to mean?"

He wiped his eyes. "Oh, nothing. Except that you are, hands down, singularly the biggest, most obvious homosexual I have ever seen in my life."

I was at a juncture. Should I help the man, or should I turn my nose up at him and forsake Wendy? I sniffed, and asked, "She said that about me?"

"Well." He was large, even in those days — but this was a broad, well-built largeness, the result of many intensive hours spent exercising, rowing for his college, to be exact. "She certainly said you were handsome."

I noticed his pink blush, his thick lips; his neck was strong and he held himself with a kind of pride that I had never seen before. It was the signet ring that gave it away; with his short, neat hair and baggy, collegiate clothing I'm not sure it would have been apparent, even with the come-on.

"So are you going to help me, faggot, or not?" he asked.

I helped him, all right — against my better judgment. Perhaps I was soft in those days, or just overly emotional. Perhaps I was still too new at this to be numbed by physical affection — or, as it was with Eric, fornication that almost lacked affection. He crashed into me like a plow, without any lubrication at all, even the slightest hint of spit. It was raw, and I bled profusely, which softened his thrusting, but by that time my asshole was stinging so intensively I could barely make out the feeling of being fucked. Kinder than I should have been, when he was finished I used the mingled, loose solution of my blood and his seed that slopped out over my buttocks to lubricate _him_.

Fantastic, no, but by the time it was over he'd somehow convinced me with mewling and slapping to speak to my father on his (or was it Wendy's?) behalf.

My father saw in my tense expression what was going on, and I felt a bit sorry for him. Never when he was a younger man did he expect his queer son to plead with him to let one of his failing lovers join a geology course. It took only the first three weeks of the next term for my father to give up on him. Eric had no aptitude for work; forget languages or geology. As a last resort, I introduced him to Garrison, who did not blink at any pretty boy who wanted to read English. And Eric was, if nothing else, pretty; he got his looks from his mother, a busty daughter of German immigrants. I quickly learned that Eric's grandparents had come into the country with Liane in 1943, their visas expedited as they were friends of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor. In short, they were Nazis. Liane I met once, at a commencement ceremony — she was an insanely attractive woman. Eric had no discernable father, and I figured out within hours of meeting his mother that she 'supported' herself mostly on her looks and, at times, on her back. For whatever reason, this did not bother Eric. They had the same doe-like eyes and the same propensity for voluptuousness.

Soon, I was not the most obvious homosexual Eric had ever met. "Varnish, really?" he asked Butters the first time I introduced them. Butters clung to Bradley and explained that he performed drag shows for tips on Friday nights at the local queer pub; Eric only guffawed at him and called him a faggot. Upon meeting Kyle, Eric wasted no time dissolving into fits of laughter: "You are the ugliest Jewess I have ever met!" he cried, and Kyle had slapped him. "Oh, you have no idea how to hit a man, do you? I can teach you, you know. I'll spank your arse until it's the color of your hideous hair. I bet you'd like that, wouldn't you, Jewess?"

In light of this, I told Wendy that after having gotten Eric into two separate courses, my obligation was fulfilled. "And I'm done sleeping with him, too, I can certainly tell you that much," I added. "If he fails anymore courses you'll have to find another of your queer friends to help him. I'm through."

"But don't you enjoy it?" she asked, ignoring my addendum.

I told her I didn't. I hadn't been with him since that day, and wasn't hung up on it at all. Kyle, regrettably, found that he _did_ enjoy sleeping with Eric. Oh, he would act infuriated about it, claiming all sorts of things: "I cannot stand him! If he calls me a 'Jewess' one more time I shall call up my father and have him enact a military tribunal and have all the Cartmans thrown out of England! They can be deported to Israel and tried and executed for all I care!" But ultimately, he thoroughly enjoyed Eric spanking his arse, up to the day when Eric left him. It was Kyle's first relationship, and his first heartbreak. Sometimes, when two of your friends break it off (regardless of how little you actually liked one of them), you wonder which of them got the raw end of things. Kyle, of course, had been trying to find some happiness all this time, chasing every man who looked like bad news. Eric, on the other hand, hadn't managed to find a man since.

XXX

"What's the surprise, then?" Kyle asked Eric immediately.

We'd found him ensconced in a large booth near the back of Camp, an organdy curtain concealing the table from direct view. In front of him were six empty pints and one quarter-full, which I presumed he was working on. Eric drank Guinness, always preferring heavy stouts to just about almost anything else, pronouncing the rest of the alcoholic corpus 'faggy.' (I often wondered what exactly about _whisky_ was so faggy.)

"Patience, Jew," Eric growled. In a swift motion he swept up the pint and tipped the last of his beverage into his mouth. His size made it difficult for alcohol to affect him, but seven pints was a lot so early in the evening, even for Eric. "All will be revealed."

"Well, move your monolithic arse over so the rest of us can have a seat, then." Kyle began trying to shift Eric further into the booth, but moving him would have been a Herculean task.

He chuckled derisively at Kyle, and shook his head. "Pathetic," he said. "You have absolutely no upper-arm strength."

Butters and I looked at each other, knowing where this discourse was headed. On cue, Kyle roared back, "And you're so morbidly obese your behind has got its own constituency!"

Eric did not miss a beat. "So I'm sure it's just a matter of time before your bitch Jew mum moves in and runs for parliament!"

They had done this act solidly since their first meeting. The year or so during which they formalized their relationship had been no exception. Listening to it was exhausting. Whatever his personal accomplishments, Kyle could not resist the siren's call of bantering with Eric. He wasn't wrong; Eric was so enormously fat that the pursuit of inventing new ways to insult him about it had become boring about 10 years prior. When there is no more fun in concocting delicious metaphors to describe a man's girth, you know things have become humorlessly dire. Part of me was quite glad to have fucked Eric long before he let himself go. Problematically, he was a man of appetites — and I do mean just about every appetite one could imagine. When school ended and he stopped rowing, he had no counter-balance for them, and everything just went to hell. About the time that Eric began bothering Kyle about the end of the affair with Christophe ("Actually, I think you're one up this time, Jew — lord knows you're too cheap to support an unemployed Frenchman"), Butters turned to me and said, "I really think I need a drink," which was just about the best thing I'd heard him say all night.

"You're not the only one," I agreed.

"So, let's get one, then?" he asked me, and I was about to drag him off toward the bar when a golden-haired young man who as almost certainly not old enough to be in a gay nightclub on a Saturday night shoved his way past us, holding two pints. He immediately caught Eric's attention.

"Ah, yes," Eric said warmly, gesturing at his lap for the blond boy. "Surprise, gentlemen."

"Oi, Eric," the boy said cheerily. He wedged his way onto Eric's lap. I noticed that his feet were planted firmly on the floor, as if he were simply using Eric's great thigh as a balance while he postured. When Eric just tensed his lips without answering, the boy shrugged and handed him one of the two beers. "Here's a Guinness, love. I kept the change." His words were mired in a very faint Irish lilt. "Who's this lot?"

Taking the stout, eyes narrowed, Eric finally decided to answer him. "This lot are my friends," he said, scanning Kyle, Miss B, and I as if we might suddenly decide to pull revolvers from our nonexistent holsters and gun him down. "Although lord knows I do hate them, and they'll be lucky if I haven't found better models by the morning."

Butters lowered his eyes. "Oh." He sniffed audibly. Little things like this, much as they were to be expected, sort of got to him. "Why, you know that isn't a particularly nice thing to say, Eric."

"I don't give a bloody fuck," he said. He took a sip of his pint and not-so-subtly snaked his free fingers into the blond boy's shaggy hair. "Go suck a fat one, Butters, I mean it."

"Well, I for one have been meaning to divest myself of you since I met you," Kyle said imperiously, and about half a minute too late.

"So why don't you do it, then? Make life a bit sunnier for the both of us, wouldn't you, instead of piddling around here like Butters' sissy bulldog?"

Butters struggled forth with, "Now, that's crossing the line, Eric, I mean really…"

Sighing, I took a final look at the boy, who had against all odds managed to worm the fingers of one of his hands into Eric's back pocket. He had a smug look on his face like he was quite proud of this whole position, and I don't entirely mean the way his threadbare denim-clad arse was enthroned upon our friend's knee. With his rosy lips carefully pressed into a subtle O-form, he looked at me, and for the moment our eyes locked I was thrown. His were blue, aquamarine-ish, the green invading his pupils much like it invaded Kyle's. I managed to all but spout out, "And who's _this_, then?"

"Oh." Eric managed to put down his Guinness. "Yes, how rude of me. Gentlemen." He paused for a moment, just to build on the irritation. This was a specialty of his, to be sure. "This is Kenneth. Say hello, dear." With his free hand, he prodded Kenneth in the thigh.

"Hullo," he said. "Kenny's fine. I prefer it. And I'm sure you're none of you as bad as Eric says."

"Like fuck they're not," Eric grumbled. "The Jew in particular is especially horrid."

"Which one is the Jew?" the boy asked, unguarded.

Eric heaved a sigh of great exhaustion, snatched up his glass again, and then said, "The one who looks Jewish," as if it were that simple.

Kyle tensed. "Oh, that's it," he announced, throwing his hands up. "I'm off for a drink. You're worse than Hitler, Eric, you know that, don't you."

"Keep reminding me," Eric entreated.

"Come on, Stanley." Kyle grabbed me by the wrist and tugged me toward the bar. For a moment it occurred to me that we were leaving Butters behind, and that he had wanted a drink, but I quickly forgot about it.

XXX

I ordered a whisky. It was not my Saturday evening regular, but my mood was too fragile to chance anything out of the ordinary comfort a stiff serving of whisky provided. It was a drink with a strong character, a stable sort of masculinity. I felt a little tipsy, and knew I was overthinking things. When Kyle ordered I gave the bartender a card to open a tab. It had already been a long night.

We stood there, stiff-lipped and not speaking for several minutes, even after we got our drinks. A dance floor of men with either more motivation or fewer cares than we had throbbed away before us. Every so often, a wayward limb jutted awkwardly out of the crowd. Kyle sighed in between sips, his eyes hooded and his posture rigid. I kept a hand on his lower back; I don't know why. Most nights out we did not dance; dancing was primarily an engagement for the young, and although the vast majority of the Camp population was in our demographic, we were still at the peak of the acceptable range. Any older, and we would have had to have spend our nights out at a dingy piano bar or some café, kitsching it up like Quentin Crisp on some Shaftesbury corner, avoiding the annoyed glares of younger men who could only assume they'd never turn into us. Both Kyle and I were deeply afraid of this happening.

Out of nowhere, the pensive nowhere I was lost in, Kyle asked, "Well, what the fuck?"

"I don't know." I put my lips to the rim of my glass.

"It's been years since Eric's had anyone. Decades!"

"Perhaps he's had a few, and he just hasn't told us."

"That's complete rubbish. This is Eric we're discussing. He can't keep a thing to himself. He can barely resist getting Butters on the phone to describe the consistency of everything he eats and how much it cost. If he ever had a boy since school, he'd have mentioned it."

I had to concede this to Kyle; Kyle did know Eric rather well. But, I had to remind myself, so did I. While Eric managed to retain some of his shapely sportsman physique, he hadn't displayed any success in bedding lads. Certainly the thought of sleeping with him now would make anyone's skin crawl.

"I simply do not understand," Kyle concluded. "Help me figure this one out."

"Let's not waste our breath." I gestured, in fact, to the boy himself, as he was headed right for us.

Kyle stiffened when approached, and I dropped my hand from his waist.

"Time for another drink," the boy said. His words were far too chipper for the dim, smoky room, even if the soundtrack was generally danceable, with the Beat preaching caution overhead. Behind us I heard the bartender singing along, "Just hold my hand while I come to a decision on it," but he didn't have a very good voice, so I blocked it out. Needlessly, as it happened, because while Kyle glared at him, the boy asked for an IPA, which forced the bartender to stop singing.

"So," the boy said after placing his order, and asking to put it on my tab, "Is this a typical night out in your circle?"

"Sure," Kyle said, looking away.

"Well, no, not really." I indicated our table. "We all begin drinking at Kyle's flat. Usually Eric comes along. And usually he's rather unaccompanied."

"Oh." The boy shrugged, and reached behind himself to take his pint from the bartender, who gave him a cushy wink. "Yeah," he said after an initial sip. "He hasn't mentioned anyone else, really."

Kyle snorted. "Small wonder," he said.

"What's the problem?" Kenny asked.

"You're so young," I marveled.

"And utterly gorgeous," Kyle added. "What's a gorgeous young lad like you doing with a fat old lump like Eric, anyway?"

"I'm not that young, and I'm not that gorgeous," Kenny said, but he said it in the sort of way that told us he didn't believe it. He coughed into his sleeve. "As for Eric…" He sighed. "Well, I like him. He's got something … I don't know what." He paused. "Well, that, and he's paying me."

"Paying you?" I sputtered out. "Good god, _of course_. Of course, you're too pretty _not_ to be a prostitute, aren't you?"

"Ha!" Kyle slapped me on the back. "I knew it! No one in their right mind would want to be trapped under all those rolls of fat. _No one_! Unless they were making money off of it!"

"Oh, I do like him," he said, somewhat convincingly. "He's cruel, but quite funny. And he's very youthful. He's like a madman. It's exhilarating."

"But—" I remembered I had to swallow my mouthful of drink before speaking, and did so. "But would you want to be with him if he _weren't_ paying you?"

He answered in a heartbeat: "Well, no, of course not."

"Oh, this is too delicious." Kyle reached up with his free hand to twist a curl of hair, and remembering he had none, pouted and decided to work on his drink. Kenny looked at him curiously. "What?" Kyle asked impatiently, between sips.

"Nothing."

"Ah, so." I was trying to be talkative. It is hard to continue on a conversation with someone you've just learned is being paid for sex and company by your very spiteful, very rotund friend. "How old are you?"

A moment passed before he answered, "I am 23."

"Oh, right. Well, you know Eric will be 38 next month, of course."

"Of course." He nodded awkwardly.

"Where did you go to school?" I asked while he was in the middle of a gulp of lager.

He shook his head enthusiastically before swallowing. "No," he gasped out, when he had an empty mouth. "I didn't."

Kyle chose this moment to jump back into the conversation. "Well, Eric read English with us at Oxford," he announced. I had always found it fascinating that the only time Kyle was likely to offer praise to Eric (however indirectly) was when he was in the company of someone whom he seemed to think even _lower_ than Eric. It was as if he were saying, _Eric is about the worst human being I know, and yet you're worse than he is, and should be ashamed. Congratulations_. With a few more drinks in him, he might just start saying that. Only time would tell.

"Ah, didn't know that," Kenny said. He was either too stupid to know he was being insulted, or was purposefully choosing not to acknowledge it. "He really hasn't told me much about himself, or any of you." He heaved a sigh. He began to reach for his pocket and halted. It was an odd oasis of awkwardness in the desert of our conversation. Then he added, "Well, except that you're together, of course. How long has it been?"

This made me choke on my whisky, and Kyle actually spit what he was drinking at the moment back into his pint. I felt my heart seizing, though, and I felt Kyle tense next to me.

"We certainly are _not_!" he exclaimed, so loud that even over the operatic old Genesis tune playing overhead, some tough-looking bloke at the bar next to him gave him a dirty look. Kyle noticed this and snapped out a very unconvincing, "Sod off!" before returning to our conversation. "Oh, he told you that, did he?" Kyle asked. "Well, that's, that's just _fabulous_."

"So," Kenny said. "It _hasn't_ been very long?"

"This is just ridiculous!"

I was still struggling to catch my breath.

Kyle kept on at it: "We are _not_ together. We have not _been_ together. I just ended a semi-domestic relationship, and Stanley's no slouch either. I don't know what game you're playing, or more likely, what game _he's_ playing at, but I assure you, it's not amusing to go around falsely assuming whatever you like about people!"

"Yes," I wheezed. Obviously these surprise inquiries into my fictional relationship with Kyle were irritating my asthma. Moreover, Kyle's reaction wasn't exactly in line with my continuing fantasy that one day we _might_ get together.

"Are you all right?" he asked me, finally noticing that I wasn't breathing so easily.

"Fine," I managed. Kyle set his drink down — it was almost empty, anyway — and took mine out of my hands.

"Here," he said, beginning to rub slow circles on my back. "Is that all right, dearest?" I nodded, and he turned back to Kenny. "So you go back and tell Eric, your lover, or employer, or however he wants you to figure into his life, that it's not funny, and he just barely avoided giving Stanley an asthma attack."

"Terribly sorry," he said with a shrug. "How horrible for whichever of you likes the other one more!" And then, with the drink I bought him in hand, he left, presumably to head back to the table.

"Really!" Kyle huffed. He was still rubbing my back.

"I'm fine."

"No, you're not, you're wheezing all over the place."

"I went swimming today," I explained.

"Well," Kyle said. I loved the shade of pink his cheeks turned when he was frustrated. "I keep telling you the swimming's no good, dear. Look at what it's doing to you. The slightest implication that we might be together sets off your asthma."

"Really," I tried to assure him. "I _am_ fine. I was just caught off guard. By any number of things." I added.

"Oh, right, of course. And while we're on the subject? That boy _is not_ 23."

"I know. I suppose the question shouldn't now be, 'How old is he,' but rather, 'Is that lad even _legal_?'"

It was a question neither of us could answer at the moment.

After ordering new drinks, we decided to head back to the table. Out of the corner of my eye, I spied old Clyde, and, just my luck, he was chatting with Craig — and that towheaded excuse for a date he kept cropping up with lately. I groaned, hoping Kyle wouldn't even notice that Clyde was at Camp.

He just asked me, "Is it really all that horrible, the idea that we might be together?"

I didn't know what to say. So I said, "Look, old Clyde's here."

Kyle shook with slight disgust. "Remember what I asked you? I mean it, Stanley. Please keep me away from him."

"Of course."

The moment we got to the table, Eric announced, "We've decided we'd like some cocaine now," like he was ordering a round of drinks or a plate of sandwiches or something. It was refreshing, though, that he tended to dispose of all euphemisms and slang terms and just cut to the punch, letting 'cocaine' roll off his tongue as if it weren't illegal (or expensive).

"Who, you and your eight stomachs?" Kyle asked, slipping into the booth.

"No," Eric growled. "Myself and Kenneth and Butters."

"Oh, I'm quite all right, thank you, no drugs for me tonight," Butters said.

"Shut it, Butters."

I slipped into the booth beside Kyle.

"Well, I'm looking forward to getting to know you all," Kenny announced awkwardly.

Eric rolled his eyes and snorted. "The Jew is a depressive size queen, Butters used to impersonate Marianne Faithfull until his boyfriend was murdered, and Stanley fancies himself the next Waugh, but his work reads like the instructions for applying a rubber." He took a great gulp of his drink, consuming a third of the pint in one chug. "There," he huffed, wiping his lips. "I just explained everything to you. That should have saved you a few hours."

"You all seem so interesting," Kenny said with a laugh.

Butters stuck up his hand as if he were in a lecture. "I was a period piece, really," he explained. "I did a mean Julie Driscoll 'Season of the Witch,' actually, and—"

"That's enough, Butters. He doesn't care about your storied drag career."

"What do you do now?" Kenny asked, ignoring Eric, who sighed and rolled his eyes and looked off in the distance as he couldn't be bothered. "Oh, and I'm dreadfully sorry about your boyfriend."

"Oh." Butters blushed. "It's fine, he was … well, it's been a bit since then. I work in a bookstore now."

"Oh, all right, fancy that." Kenny answered with all the disinterest of someone who obviously did not read. I took this as a cue to talk about myself.

"Eric's got one thing off, though," I said jovially. "Rubber instructions are more interesting than anything _I've_ written."

"I shouldn't say that," said Kyle. "I've got no interest in using a rubber, and I rather like your writing."

Now I blushed. "That's kind of you to lie for me, darling."

"Oh, now, I do mean it."

"And that's what I adore about you."

Kyle blew me a kiss over his cider, which he proceeded to sip from.

"They're always doing this faggy stuff," Eric announced, turning to Kenny. "It's sickening, isn't it?"

"I wouldn't say that," Kenny said with a smile. I had half a mind to say something about Eric's apparent claim that Kyle and I were an item, but decided against it. Perhaps with Kyle sitting next to me getting into the details of how we _weren't_ would have been too painful. In any case, I cleared my throat disruptively, and felt Kyle's thigh shaking against mine. Maybe he was nervous about all the things we were dancing around.

"So," Eric said slyly. I noticed one of Kenny's arms was twisted around one of his. The boy was resting his chin on Eric's shoulder. He didn't look disgusted at all, which was the reaction I generally expected of contact with Eric. He was being paid for his work, though, and if I knew something about prostitution (which, as it happens, I did), it was that the key to earning your keep was to avoid acting disgusted, because any number of fat older men might want you to not be disgusted by them, and if they were looking to repulse potential tricks they might as well just try their luck in the dating pool. While I was staring at the boy, Kyle was drinking again, slowly and curiously, still massaging my lower back. I didn't balk at this, and soon enough we were all staring at Eric expectantly as he asked, "Who's in?"

The boy answered first: "Me, of course."

"Yes, of course," Eric mumbled. Then he looked to Miss B. "Well?" he asked.

"Oh, but I don't _want_ any."

"Goddamit, Butters, _buy in_."

With a deep sigh, Butters reached into his back pocket and pulled out a wad of bills. He licked his thumb and then cautiously flipped through his money as if it were a card catalogue. Too many years of working in a bookstore, maybe, or perhaps without Bradley's income he was actually worse off financially than before, despite the fact that he now had a real job — and I wasn't sure dressing up as a lady and singing throwback tunes from our university days really netted Miss B all that much pay. Still, he pulled a twenty out of the wad and asked, "Will that suffice?"

Butters had never learned, in all his years of dealing with Eric, that the way to approach these things was not to ask, but rather, to announce something more along the lines of, "That will suffice."

Predictably, Eric sighed and said, "No, Butters, that will _not_ suffice."

Of course, Butters didn't do what I would have done, which was say, "Yes it will," and shut Eric up. This was the very sort of thing I _loathed_ about Butters. He was so averse to conflict with anyone that he would let himself be led through this test of Eric's will against his own general dislike of recreational drugs (other than alcohol, of course). The right thing to do in this situation was either to just say, "Goddamit, no, I'm not going along with this" so Eric would get tired of speaking with you and move on to bullying the next person, or just go along with it and perhaps enjoy a night of electrified anarchy. But that was Butters, the drag queen who gave 'drag' a whole new uninspired meaning. Predictably, Butters folded, and pulled out another twenty, and turned his head away from Eric, who turned his sights on Kyle now.

Turning to me, Kyle stopped rubbing my back and put his drink down. "Shall we go in together?" he asked. "I've got some cash, but if you pay, I'll get it the next time."

I rolled my eyes, because it was unlikely that Kyle would get it the next time or any time at all until one of us dropped dead, or we decided we'd finally gotten too old for nights out amplified by drug use. I didn't know when that was going to happen, but I figured it was slated for around the time Kyle and I both found stable domestic partners — possibly sometime around the new millennium.

"Sure," I said with some cheer in my voice. I tossed some money onto the table like it didn't matter, but inwardly I cringed. I knew there would be a gap before getting paid for the story I'd turned in on Tuesday and the following assignment. The coming week might see me on the phone with my father, begging him for money, trying desperately not to answer his question with an irritated, "It all went to pot! Literally!"

Shuffling the bills together like a bank teller — a position I can assure you Eric had never held, as he found banking too Jewish — he sighed. "Well, whatever this buys," he said aimlessly. He thrust the bills toward me. "Go get it, Stanley. Good quality, this time — I want a nice, clean high, not to be sick the next day like an amateur."

"If you don't want to be sick, maybe you shouldn't snort cocaine, Eric," Butters said wisely.

Eric didn't even respond to this. He just rolled his eyes and made a face at Kenny, like the boy shared some great understanding of how miserable it was to be friends with us. I was hardly going to claim any kind of mystic connection with the lad, but he seemed all right, and it appeared we were getting on fine, so I wasn't sure what Eric was attempting to communicate to him. Then again, his money should at least have bought him a sympathetic smile, which, in fact, did materialize, if not a bit late.

I really wasn't in the mood to leave my comfortable seat, my drink, or Kyle in the hands of a fascist ex, a duplicitous prostitute, and Butters. "Why do I have to do it? I did it last time, didn't I? If you want blow so bad, Eric, why not get off your arse and go fetch it yourself?"

"Stanley, just be a gentleman for once and go do it," Eric insisted.

"I don't see why I should."

Eric was beginning to turn red with irritation at my stubbornness. I protested these things, at times, just to make a point to Eric that not everyone was happy to just follow his orders. But it did happen to be true that I was not really in the mood to go stumbling through the club. Who knew who I would run into? Moreover, the one person I was certain to meet on this trip was Damien, our drug dealer, and I didn't really like him. He was like a rocker to my Mod, I felt — despite the fact he was probably 10 year younger than I.

Well, no, actually — he seemed 10 years younger _now_, but it occurred to me that in a very threatening way, he was ageless, dark and moody in perpetuity, dispensing narcotics from the women's room in a gay nightclub on Charing Cross … never mind that all restrooms in any such establishment were, by nature, men's rooms in the end. Beyond that, as Kyle liked to put it, "The world is a man's toilet." I think he'd said that to me while he was pissing in some alley in Islington; I may have been shielding him with my coat.

While they were all making faces — Kenneth amused, Eric disgruntled, and Butters sympathetic — Kyle tugged on my sleeve. "I'd appreciate it so much, dearest," he said. He took my hand and nudged me. "Won't you go get me a bit, hmmm? I'd appreciate it."

"I really don't see why Eric shouldn't do it."

"Well, perhaps he should, but he's entertaining his new sweetheart" — even Butters couldn't maintain a straight face at that — "and I feel the need for a buzz."

So I did it. I felt so ambivalent about drugs — loved the effects; hated the process. As I brushed by the gyrating bodies spilling out from the dance floor and into the hallway, I pondered whether I wanted any at all. My relationship with drugs was so … unenthusiastic. I wasn't truly sure if I had one. The clandestine way we discussed procuring and using them was so formal, so aggravating. It just wasn't funny or enjoyable anymore, and I didn't know from where this rage into cocaine had come, but it seemed like everyone was sucking it up like vampires after lymphocytes. If I was becoming old, I'd first noticed it in the way my appreciation and use of drugs had calmed.

There were two men snogging in the loo, and I had to shove them aside to get in. It annoyed me that they were blocking the door, and when I'd gotten past I was confronted by the drug dealer fucking a lad with blond pageboy whose shirt was lifted up to his nipples against the mirror. The slim, pasty curve of his belly was impaled on the ledge of the sink. The boy didn't look too happy about this at all, but who was I to put a stop to it? I just stood there gawking at the two of them as the lad was thrust again and again into the protrusion of the toilet hardware, and Damien was gagging his pink, curled mouth with his dirty fingers. If this boy wasn't bruised all over tomorrow I'd be very surprised.

Damien must have seen me in the mirror because, without looking, he said in two or three heavy groans, "Just stay right fucking there, Marsh."

I shrugged and hung back. A second pair of lovers thumped into me, not pausing to offer an apology on their way to the open stall. Rubbing my own rapidly bruising upper arm, I backed again the wall and tried to ignore the show in front of me. The boy was squealing, piglet-like and terrified. Damien was soundless and blissful when he came, squashing his lover's face into the mirror's glass with intense, longing hatred. I knew what hatred looked like in a man dying the little death — I'd had sex with Eric.

Damien pushed himself off and out and the (page)boy bent over into the sink. I thought the lad might vomit, the way his hands immediately flew to his stomach, but he was merely protecting the lacerations from the pounding he'd just received. Whatever the case, he was retching.

Stuffing his pale, studded cock back into his pants, Damien stumbled toward me. "What do you want?" he asked — too irritated, I felt, for a man who'd just orgasmed.

"Um." I nervously got the bills from my back pocket and handed them to Damien. "Whatever this buys."

He rolled his eyes. "And I'm supposed to just know what you want?"

He had a point. "Eric's usual. Whatever _he_ likes." I made sure to emphasize the _he_, because it wasn't for me.

"I don't memorize what drugs people take. I have far more important things to worry about."

"Well, I don't see why you shouldn't. It's your goddamn job, after all."

Before I knew it, he had me around the collar. "How dare you tell me how to do my job!"

I could swear in his fury his eyes were turning red. "Apologies," I choked, feebly swatting at his fists. He released me, and I stumbled before regaining my balance. "Blow, please."

"Pip!" Damien barked, staring at me with his teeth gritted, and the blond boy brought his button nose and grey eyes out from the sink in which he had been sulking.

"Yes, Damien?" he asked. His voice was effusive, but tinged with a tremor.

"Don't just stand there. Get Stanley his purchase."

"Yes, sir. Right away." The lad, apparently named Pip, pushed himself off from the sink counter and limped into the stall that wasn't being used for an incredibly audible act of fellatio. After a moment, Pip returned, and handed me a baggie of white powder.

"This is it?" I asked Damien, scoffing. "You must be mad."

"Well, it's quality product. You want something middling, or do you want something that meets with a standard?"

"Who standardizes these things?" I asked.

"I don't have time for your whining today, Marsh. Pip needs me to administer to his lacerations."

"Oh, no, Damien, I'm quite fine on my own, thank you, and—" A loud moan from the occupied couple interrupted him.

Damien rolled his eyes. "Not now, Pip."

Pip lowered his eyes, and clasped his hands in front of his abdomen, elbows out. He looked like a schoolboy. "Yes, Damien." With a gentle sigh, he hung his head.

XXX

"This is pitiful!" Eric cried when I dropped the baggie into his lap. "This is barely enough for one!"

"Is that one normal-sized," Kyle said as I slid back into the booth, "or one disproportionate fat arse?"

Eric ignored this. "Well, Butters, it looks like you're out on this one."

Butters rolled his eyes and leaned back in the booth.

"Give me," Eric said to Kenny.

Kenny was clearly well-trained, because he ducked a bit for cover and came up to hand Eric a small mirror. From his pocket he procured a credit card, and he began to cut lines of cocaine, neat and symmetrical, queued up like prisoners at inspection. If there was anything of Germany left in Eric's genes, it was apparent in the way he did things: calculating, neat, straight and fussily.

"And no one notices if you just do this in the open?" Kenny asked. "Or minds?"

"You underestimate Eric's sense of caution," I said. "That curtain to your right actually does a fairly adequate job of concealing whatever is happening here, and the bartenders are too busy to watch."

"Ah." Kenny hunched over to inhale his line of charlie, which he did with a neatly wound fiver Eric had drawn from his front pocket. He slid the mirror in front of Eric. As Eric mechanically snorted his line, it occurred to me that I had never taken drugs with a prostitute before, let alone stuck the same 5-pound note up my nose. I wondered if Eric and Kenny had been taking a lot of drugs together, as they seemed to have a shared process.

After finishing, Eric grunted in satisfaction and wiped his nose.

"Not that I'd like to be made an example of, because I surely wouldn't, but you'll notice that everyone's doing it," Butters commented.

"Yeah." Kyle reached across the table to snatch the rolled-up bill from Eric's fingertips. "If I had some image to protect, like Craig, maybe, or _Token_" – he looked at me pointedly, with knit brows – "perhaps I might care. But what does it matter if anyone sees me doing this in the open? Who am I protecting?"

"Ah, whatever." Kenny rested his head on Eric's shoulder. "Don't over-explain it or anything, now."

I took the mirror in front of me and bent over to inhale my line. After this round, Eric made another mirror's worth of lines, and I declined to take any more. Kyle volunteered to have mine, and I sighed as I told him yes, of course he was welcome.

It was more or less silent while we went through this ritual, but by the time we were done, Kyle was whining and running his lips over my shoulder, begging me, "Oh, why won't you dance with me, Stanley?"

"Because I'm not in the mood," I growled.

"I am," he declared, climbing over my thighs to get out of the booth. "If you don't come with me I will just have to dance with whomever I find."

"Provided they're interested."

"Fine," he said, taking a moment to gaudily and slowly tilt his behind in front of my face and waggle it at great length. "Suit yourself, Stanley!"

He ran off into the crowd.

"And why don't you go after him?" Kenny asked.

Miss B and Eric looked at each other.

"Oh, dear," Butters said, grasping Kenny's hand. "It doesn't work like that most days."

XXX

An hour later, Kyle hadn't turned back up, and I ventured out into the crowd — only to find him plastered to old Clyde at a table nearer to the entrance. He was grinding his crotch into Clyde's, and the old bore didn't seem to be enjoying it quite as much as I would have.

"All right, honey, let's go," I said gently, trying to wrench Kyle from Clyde's slack form. "You don't want to make it with him."

"He doesn't?" Clyde asked. He wasn't being sarcastic. He was genuinely asking.

"No," I said sternly. "Trust me."

Kyle was trying to say, "No, I want to," but he got a bit slurry when he was in his cups, so it was coming out more like, "Nuh, ah wanna," and all the while he was pawing at Clyde's trousers.

"I think he wants to," Clyde informed me, as if this were a sincere discussion about whether or not Kyle might like to go home with him.

"No, he doesn't. You live with your parents. You haven't even got your own flat."

"I'm between flats. I'm thinking I may move out to Shropshire. Go live in the country and all."

"That sounds a wonderful plan, dear, and I wish you luck, but I really think you should leave Kyle out of it."

"Well, he doesn't have to come or anything. I just think he wants to go home with me." This statement was roughly illustrative of old Clyde's problem. Any other man I knew would have jumped on the opportunity to make a pun out of his statement that Kyle didn't have to come. Old Clyde just left it there. He had no capacity for imagination.

Kyle now attempted to break into the conversation. "I don't like him, I just want his cock. You'll give me your cock, won't you? I need it so." Then he began sucking at Clyde's neck.

It was making me ill to watch this.

"Oh, all right." Clyde shrugged at me, and I shrugged back. "Well, how about we just do it in the loo, then?"

I didn't even know who he was asking.

Kyle was rather enjoying himself, I could tell, so in exasperation, I threw my hands in the air. "Suit yourself," I said, although I also wasn't certain of to whom I was saying it.

Old Clyde, despite the situation he was (undeservedly) fortunate to be in, seemed preoccupied by something behind me. I snapped my fingers in his face.

"I think someone is coming toward us," he said, shoving my hand away from his nose.

"Who?" I asked. I whipped around, only to find Kenny trotting over.

"Oi, Stan," Kenny said in greeting. "Eric's wondering where you've both gone off to."

"Is he now?" I asked, rolling my eyes.

"Oh, sure. He's babbling away like I've never heard him before."

"That's the charlie for you," I said.

"Who's Charlie?" old Clyde asked.

I smacked my own forehead in exasperation. Then, realizing that Kenny probably did not know that, in the most pointless and obtuse way, old Clyde worked for the government, I gestured to him. "This is Clyde," I said flatly.

"Clyde Donovan," Clyde said, grinning broadly. "Undersecretary for Passport Services at Her Majesty's Home Office." He stuck out a hand, which Kyle easily avoided whilst drunkenly slobbering down Clyde's shirt collar.

Kenny took Clyde's hand and pumped it slowly. "Kenneth McCormick," he announced, his eyes narrow. Anyone should have been able to discern the mocking tone to his voice, but this was lost on old Clyde, obviously. "Male prostitute. And I do birthdays."

"How do you mean you 'do' birthdays?" Clyde asked.

"I'll tell you for a tenner," Kenny replied. "And I'll _show_ you for 50."

"Er." Old Clyde put a wary hand on Kyle's thigh, which got him to stop licking Clyde's collarbone and cling instead across those boxy shoulders. I will say this about the man: He was not physically unattractive. What he was, however, was physically indistinctive. "I think I'm occupied," Clyde said, ruffling the hem of Kyle's sweater, which earned him an appreciative purr.

"Stanley, really." Kyle tried to wave his hand in my face, but he wasn't looking at me because he was too pressed up against Clyde's chest, and his fingers managed only to brush my neck. "I'll call you in the morning."

At a loss, I bit my lip.

"Well." Kenny cleared his throat. "Come on, then. Buy me a drink, won't you?"

"Sure." Swallowing regretfully, I followed him to the bar.

XXX

By 5 a.m., most of Camp had emptied out. Butters had long since departed, claiming he had to go home and look after Desdemona, his pet bulldog. Kyle had left with old Clyde, and I wasn't sure where they'd gone — Kyle's flat? Clyde's parents' again? Maybe they were just sloppily humping in someone's private garden; maybe they had been arrested for it. The thought of Kyle out there with old Clyde made me incredibly sad, and a little bit angry, both at myself for letting it happen and at Kyle for being too stupid to control himself despite my best attempts to halt it. I think I was most furious at old Clyde, however, for absconding with my boy and being so innocently clueless about how horrible the whole thing made me feel. It was hardly worth making a great fuss over, but I made sure to heave as many whimsical sighs as I could fit into an hour.

Eric was passed out and slumped over the tabletop, drool puddling from his greedy lips in an incandescent blob. This left myself — and Kenneth, of course, who was contractually (despite the absence of a contract) bound to remain wherever Eric had passed out until Eric woke up again. I was beginning to see the upshot of this deal — the boy received a place to live, top-notch rations, entry into posh locales, pricey narcotics, and some pocket money each week, and all he had to do was wait around while the great lout exhausted himself by overindulging. Perhaps once in a while Eric would want to have sex, but it seemed like a lovely little deal to me. I was beginning to wonder why I hadn't eschewed an education and run off to the capital to find a desperate older man to dote on me and essentially pay me to look pretty back when I was Kenny's age — however old _that_ was. Then again, of course, my youth had been splotchy, gawky, and full of self-doubt and self-loathing. (Photographic evidence had long since revealed Kyle's years from puberty up to our meeting as bespectacled and full of really horrific-looking dental contraptions, the same type that made my sister so angry in _her_ day.)

I don't know what moved me to sit there with Kenny while he waited — for that matter, I wasn't so sure what he was waiting for. Why not just take Eric back in a taxi? No matter. I kept ordering whiskies, and the edge had come off his high by then, so that we were having a rather lucid conversation that was only slightly influenced by intoxicants.

"You lot and Eric aren't so chummy, are you?" he asked.

"On the contrary, I think we're quite chummy." I tried to explain the difference between a friendly acquaintance you denigrated yourself to go out with, and an actual friend. "What we aren't is mutually respectful. Or, well … I suppose there is a lot of tension in the group, or rather, between him and everyone he's ever met. But you don't throw your friends off after 20 years, ducks, you just don't do that. It's so much neater to meet once a week to drink together and very tensely disagree about everything."

"Well, if you don't mind me asking." He drew a cigarette out of his back pocket and put it to his lips. "Do you smoke?" he asked, nudging the pack toward me.

"No. Sort of stopped that when I graduated and had no pocket money."

"None of you smoke, besides Eric?" he asked.

Eric was a great admirer of cigars, but cigar smoke was rather masculine for a night out at Camp, so he tended to keep it to his office and den. Possibly the park, too, although I tried to confine the time we spent together to Camp, so I didn't really know. "Well, Miss B is too uptight for nicotine. Kyle does tend to go on and off depending on whether he thinks it's liable to get him into or out of a relationship."

"Ah." He inhaled and exhaled, smoke circling his lips in great lashes and tendrils. "And is Kyle trying to get into or out of a relationship at the moment?"

"Honestly?" I sighed. "I don't know what the fuck he's doing. But then, neither does he, I'm sure."

"Ah."

"Ah," I repeated. "You … earlier. Eric wasn't really looking for me earlier, was he?"

"What?" Kenny tapped some ash off of his cigarette and onto the floor. "Oh, no. He wasn't."

"So why did you come get me?"

"You looked miserable, is all." He gave me a grin, then stuck his cigarette back between his lips to take another drag. I looked down at his little mess of scattered ashes on the laminate bar floor, and I noticed there were holes in his black canvas trainers. He caught me doing this, and asked, "What?"

"Oh." I shook my head. "Sorry. Just staring off."

"Yeah, you look about as pleased when you were talking to that Clyde bloke while he was making out with your boyfriend." He must have caught my pained expression after this, because he immediately appended, "I'm sorry, my mistake. _Friend_."

"Yeah, well. You might take some care with that."

"Uh huh." He jammed his cigarette butt out on the bar. "So, what do you got against Clyde?"

I shuddered. "He's just boring, boring and awful. Haven't you ever known anyone who sucks the enjoyment out of any given situation? He's like that. We've known him since school, and he's always been like that. It's like he hasn't developed at all since he was 18."

"And you're just so evolved."

"No, I'm not. We read together, you know, we all had the same tutor at school. Me and Kyle and Butters and Eric and — and Clyde, and the rest of them."

"The rest of who?"

"Ugh." I waved my hand around. "Practically everyone. That tall bloke with the blond on his arm, did you see him?"

"Who, the two who were snogging in the bathroom stall when I went in there?"

"The one with the short hair who was wearing a suit, who is always accompanied by a nervous-looking boy. I don't know the boy's name, but the bloke's name is Craig. He was in the same year as us. My friend Wendy's husband, Token, he was in the year, too. Token, I mean — Lord Black. And Craig he's — his father is … well, he's a peer, that's all you need to know. These are powerful people, you know."

"See, in my position..." He cleared his throat. "When you're the one taking money for sex, you know, you've got all the power."

"Oh, I don't think _that's_ true."

"Yeah, well. Give it a go and see how things change. Except I imagine you're above it, really."

"I should think so, or at least hope so. I'm your senior, for one thing, and a baccalaureate, and a published author. I've my own flat and I've had a handful of serious relationships. So really…" I took a sip of my drink — more for punctuation than for thirst. "Don't take it personally."

"No offense taken. I've gotten a lot of shit in my time, though, and I know how to handle it. Do you know what I mean?"

"Shit for what? I mean, what for? For being a prostitute?"

"Oh." He sighed. "You're a nice man, aren't you? Caring all about me? I'll tell you, not many people are this concerned about me back home."

"Home? Where's home?"

"Guess," he said, slamming his fist on the bar.

"Well, you obviously sound Irish."

"Yes."

"So, that's where you're from?"

"The streets of Dublin," he said with a smile. Then he added: "Or the slums of Dublin. Whatever's the nasty part of Dublin, that's all you need to know."

"Don't you have a family?" I asked. I immediately regretted my phrasing, because I knew well enough that everyone _has_ a family; does one get on with his family, is the better question.

He rolled his eyes at me. "Well, yes, I've got a family. Haven't spoken with them in a bit, but they're all out there somewhere. … I suppose by 'somewhere' I mean Dublin, because it's not like they've got the means to get the fuck out."

"And how'd _you_ get here, then?" I asked.

"Well, I'm a fucking prostitute, how do you reckon I get places? A businessman from London wanted to fuck me, and I told him I would if he took me over. It's the only time I ever took something other than cash for my services, by the way. And you know what? Best pay I ever got."

"Wasn't Eric, was it?"

"God, no. I've been here for like nine months now. I just met Eric on Monday."

"Oh? And how did that go?"

"That?"

I nodded.

"Yeah, that was fine. I was blowing a bloke in the loo at the London Stock Exchange — oh, don't make that face at me."

"What face?"

"That face! You think I don't know what that face means?"

"I don't know what you're talking about." I was telling the truth.

"That judgy, 'You're a whore' face. I know what face."

"I wasn't making any such face!"

"All right," he said with a smirk. "You don't _know_ you're making it, perhaps. Point is, I was blowing a bloke in the last stall, and he left before me, and when I came out a few minutes later, Eric was standing there, and he gave me a round of applause, and asked how much for a go, right?"

"Oh, god." I rolled my eyes.

"Yeah, so, you're making me drag this story out for forever. I give him one, and he pays me double, and he asks me where I'm living. So I tell him I've been renting a room in Bethnal Green. We get to talking, he asks me if I'd like to move in, and he'll pay me steady wages, plus room and board, to come on as his 'assistant' — only, see, the thing I'll mostly be assisting him with is erections."

I shuddered. "Yes, thanks. Think I got it."

"Wonderful." He sighed, and extracted another fag from his packet. "Sure you don't want one?"

"Yes, positive," I said.

So he shrugged, and began to smoke. "I meant a blow job." He shrugged again. With the cigarette in his mouth, he brushed his hands together. "Well, Stan, it's sure been a treat."

"Stan_ley_," I corrected him. "It's never 'Stan,' just Stanley. I cannot stand that first syllable on its own. It makes me feel like a bad stereotype of a postwar American husband, driving home from the city after a lengthy toil at the office."

"Oh, fine then, Stan_ley_." There was a willful, snooty jab in his flat-tongued pronunciation. "No husbandry for you. Or wifery, I suppose,"

"Nope," I said with a grin. "None for me."

"Well." He finally stubbed the end of his cigarette out on the bar. There was no harm in this; it was a glass surface. "Be seeing you around, Stanley. I take it you don't see Eric outside of this place?"

I shook my head.

"Well then, it'll be until next week, won't it? Unless, of course, I run into you in some backroom cottaging."

"It's possible." I shrugged. "Doubt Eric would like it, though."

The last thing he said to me was accompanied by a downright sinister smirk: "Eric doesn't like most things. But that doesn't mean I won't do them."

For his sake, I hoped that he wouldn't. Eric was ruthless, and I wished this boy understood that. At the same time, though, a great part of me wished that he never had the misfortune to discover it.

* * *

Again, thank you for reading. Feel free to let me know if something isn't working. (Or if something really is.)


	3. Chapter 3

Hello! It's obviously been a long time. I know this story doesn't have a lot of readers, but if anyone's been waiting, I apologize. Without further ado, a new chapter, complete with sex, opera, and the off-screen death of a really minor character. Enjoy!

* * *

When Kyle turned up tardy by 10 minutes for our standing Monday nighter, he looked plenty disgruntled, and in fact I had barely greeted him when he barked out, "So! Some friend you are, Stanley!" He unbelted his trench coat and I gawked at him while he moved to push back his hair, realized he hadn't got any anymore, scowled, and sat down.

Finally, I managed, "What's the matter, darling? What have I done?"

"Oh, you know well what you've done, you cad!"

I rolled my eyes. "No," I said cautiously, wondering where the waiter was with my second whisky. "Haven't got a clue."

"You let me go home with old Clyde again!"

"Oh."

"Oh!"

"Ah, all right, so that's what you're peeved about?" I shrugged, not wanting to seem like this conversation wasn't pleasing me, knowing that Kyle was still down on the man and all. "My apologies, darling. I tried to yank you away, of course, but you were well into your cups by then, and a little bit…" At this point, I sniffed and pointedly wiped my nose. "And besides, you just seemed so enthusiastic about it. In fact, you were pawing at him like you'd never been fucked in your life before, or your sphincter were a crack in the roof of a thatched cottage during an April downpour, and you needed him to plug the leak." I smiled at him. "So to speak."

"I'm absolutely shameless," he said in a thin whine. He put his elbow on the table and held his chin, sighing like he'd had his heart broken all over again. In fact, I think he had, only he was the culprit, which was even more depressing in turn. "It's not him, darling. I hate _him_. It's his cock. You know I hate the term 'size queen,' but you really have to see this thing. It's grotesque, and I do mean that in the most literal and best possible way. Isn't it always the way, though, that the best ones are attached to the most hopeless men?"

"Eh, I don't know," I said, thinking of Token. "I haven't seen a really great _huge _one since about 1970."

"Oh." He gave me a look, a wanting look, but I didn't know _what_ he wanted, so I looked away and drank whisky. He frowned, and rubbed at his hair while he looked rather peeved. After a moment, he asked, "Do you mind if we keep it short and cuisine-oriented this evening?" I was caught a bit off guard, but I must have appeared hurt, because he immediately rectified his request with, "It's not you, dear. It's me. I have a presentation to do tomorrow; I'm talking to Oxo. And if it's no problem with you, I'd prefer not to spend the duration of my pitch tomorrow trying to quell my urge to vomit."

"Oxo," I repeated. "What are you trying to sell there? And to whom?"

"Well, gravy, naturally. We're trying to peddle gravy to the well-to-do, cosmopolitan, urban, unmarried gentleman market. Just like mother used to serve, et cetera, in an attempt to capitalize on the stereotype that we are all either obsessed with or not on speaking terms with our mothers. Of course, I tend to think I'm neither, despite being a homo, and I really don't have an appetite right now for…" He scratched his head as he thought. "You know, gravy and faggots, I suppose."

"I don't believe I am all that obsessed with or furious at my mother, either. I would have put you in the former category, though."

He rolled his eyes. "Oh, odd. I sort of thought _you_ were the latter. Well, it doesn't matter. This is my second go-around with these Oxo folks. My first attempt was outright '

rejected. Not wholesome enough. Gravy, _sausages _— you get the idea. Too sexualized. … What? Why are you giving me that look?"

"Don't you ever feel just a bit alarmed that your livelihood is dependent on shameless punning?"

"Don't you ever feel just a bit alarmed that _your_ livelihood is dependent on scribbling second-rate gay erotica and begging your father for money?"

"Oh." I sniffed. "Touché."

His upper lip softened. "Oh, you know I don't mean it. I love your erotica, I really do." His eyes widened, and his smile blossomed. Then he shook it off. "So, what shall we have for dinner?"

"Um." I tapped my fingernails against the table. "How do you feel about sushi?"

"I don't feel anything about it. What is it?"

"It's fish, raw fish. Japanese rolled-up raw fish."

"Oh, heavens, that sounds just _disgusting_."

"It's not disgusting, it's fascinating. Wendy was telling me about it on the phone this afternoon, as Token took her out with someone he's got business with who's just been back from Yokohama, and—"

"Ah, no. Pick again."

"I think we should try it. She says it's really delightful."

"I _don't_ care what Wendy thinks. If it's anything like that _yucky_-something stuff you dragged me out to, I don't want it."

"_Sukiyaki_, darling."

"I don't care. Pick again."

We ended up eating mediocre Chinese food off Leicester Square. Kyle told me all about the best Chinese food he had ever eaten — in the Queens borough of New York City, which he'd visited every summer for two weeks during his childhood to spend time with his mother's relatives, a grandmother who died when he was 8, and his aunt's family. For the thousandth time since we'd met, he told me about how his first cousin was _also_ named Kyle, because the boy was a few months older, and his mother liked the name so much. When he asked her why, she always replied, 'What's the problem? You don't even live on the same continent.'

"And when we went there in July, or they came to visit us over their Christmas vacation, my mother always called me 'Kyle Two' to avoid confusion," he said, concluding a story I'd heard numerous times. "By the time my brother was old enough to laugh at how absurd this was, he was really too old to kick any longer. Of course, he would have felt differently if he had spent three weeks of each year of his childhood being called 'Ike Two.' "

"Or you might have reverted to 'Isaac.' "

"Don't think so." Kyle picked up his plastic chopsticks, one in each hand, and tapped out a little rhythm on the edge of his plate. "We've never called him by his full name. But it's nice to have a nickname. I've got nowhere to go from Kyle, except for Kyla, but I haven't been called that except in mocking, and certainly not since school."

"You don't want my input on this one," I told him. "That boy of Eric's called me 'Stan' at Camp on Saturday."

"Did you chew his ear off?"

"I don't know if I chewed his ear off, exactly, but I certainly asked him not to."

Kyle hunched his shoulders and sighed. He tilted his head back. "If he's anything like Eric he'll just be calling you something obnoxious that you find incredibly insulting and annoying for the next five years."

"As much as I don't like it, 'Stan' is not nearly as bad as 'Jewess,' darling."

"Well, you know, they're probably cut from the same cloth, is what I'm saying. Any lad interested in _living_ with that great obese scoundrel, regardless of how much he is being paid, is probably not the sort of boy you'd want to invite to your tea. Or trust. I don't trust him. That boy is bad news. He's lying about his age, and he's keeping company with Eric. Let's stay away from him."

"Good lord, darling, let's not rush to extremes. I spoke to him after you left, and despite the moral failing of being a kept boy, I found him quite intelligent." I saw Kyle raising his eyebrows. "Not _educated_, mind you, but _intelligent_. I think he has a soul in there. Maybe Kenny sees something worthwhile that Eric's been too guarded all along to let us access."

"Yes." He pushed a hunk of egg roll through the lake of soy sauce and sesame oil mingling on his plate. "Or perhaps Eric has no soul, and no archaeologist, let alone mendacious little ignorant whore, has got the tools to go excavating through those rolls of fat and hardened arteries to discover some kind of beauty within."

"My god, you are bitter tonight. What's wrong?"

"Wrong?" he sniffed. "Oh, nothing, dear, nothing's _wrong_. I just think you should stay away from the boy, is all."

"And that's going to come about _how_, by ignoring Eric?"

"You should have been ignoring him from the moment you met him!"

Now I let my chopsticks clatter onto my empty plate, which shimmered with the glistening gelatinous film of sticky pink sweet-and-sour traces of my dinner. "That's real absurd, Kyle, considering you fucked him about _10 minutes_ after meeting him, and did not let up for some time. As I recall, you wanted him to move in with you." I was blinking back emotions, and trying not to let Kyle see the truthful nature of my accusations.

"Maybe so, all right, I know that, and I've lived with my mistakes for years now! I let him abuse me, I let him perpetuate intolerable cruelty, and all in the name of misguided hope, hope that his mistreatment was truly a misinterpretation of affection, perhaps because he never had a real father, or was raised by a doltish, spineless, ex-Nazi slut. But do you know what it all made me learn, being incessantly tortured in emotional and physical ways in the name of what I always hoped I might one day be able to finally call 'love'? There is no greater psychological reading into why Eric Cartman was made the way he is. He is simply a bad egg. There is no more reason to excuse his _massive_ failings on account of his parentage than there is to excuse my neediness for my mother's preoccupied over-affection or my father's detached, aggrandizing moralism. Or, for that matter, _your _father's boozy pomposity."

He took his napkin from his lap, shook the prawn cracker crumbs from it, and when he stood, tossed it onto the table in front of him.

"So, really, Stanley, let's not get all defensively forgiving about him. The boy, I mean. Kenneth. If he's in with Eric, he's automatically a villain in my mind. You can tell everything about a person with what sort of company he keeps. Or you know what, bugger it, go chasing after the little weasel attempting to understand him. It shan't matter to me. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'll be getting home to Clyde."

I literally did spit my weak jasmine tea back into my handleless, thick-rimmed cup. "Home?" I sputtered. "To _old Clyde_?"

"Yeah, well." He shrugged his shoulders, frowning. "I _did_ ask you to stop me! I _begged_ you! But you just don't care who I go home with, do you?"

"No," I said in a breath. My heart was throbbing against my ribcage. "I do. I do care."

"Well, if you want to be a help, think of some way I can wriggle myself out of it!"

"Just, just tell him you're not interested."

"I cannot do it like that! Goddamn you, you know I can't. Sometimes you are so perfectly obtuse it makes my heart ache!" And without so much as handing over the money for his half of the bill, he stormed out of the place, leaving me to finish our prawn crackers and contemplate paying the check on my lonesome, feeling like I'd just been stepped on.

XXX

"So I went home and drank about an entire bottle of Glenfiddich and felt like an utter wretch," I concluded at the end of regaling Wendy with this story over coronation chicken sandwiches the next afternoon.

"My, my, Stanley." She twisted a dark lock around her index finger. "This is _really_ sensational!" I leaned in. "You've got to tell me everything about this lad of Eric's."

Scowling, I leaned back in my chair. "Oh, that's hardly the point at _all_," I scoffed. "It's just some _boy_."

"Well, he hasn't had a boy in the longest time! Tell me everything. Is he attractive? Is he_ tall_? You know I love when the passive fellow is taller than the active one. How old do you think he is, _truly_? Be honest!"

I put my index finger to my bottom lip. "Oh, I don't know how old he is. It's not impossible he's telling the truth about being 23 anyway, and if he is it's _still _something of a scandal — I mean, Eric's got 14 years on him in which case, and…" I trailed off. "Oh, damn you! I really don't want to discuss Eric's sex life any further today, if you don't mind, Wends."

She sighed and absent-mindedly stirred a sugar cube into her dainty cup of Westminster Afternoon Black, a blend she and Token had commissioned in honor of their 15th anniversary earlier in the year. "Oh, but _I _want to discuss it. You know we don't keep in touch, so how else am I going to get the details?"

I shrugged, because the truth was that I really was the only way she might get any details at all. Then again, neither she nor Eric had ever disclosed why they'd stopped conversing, and in typical fashion I did not push the issue, because I did not really care. The last time I saw them in each other's company was in the reception line at her wedding. He whispered something in her ear, and she scowled, and Eric sat in the corner by himself shoveling lobster parcels into his mouth. He was still attractively slender at this point, just out of university as it was. A number of pretty ladies of all social strains came over to chat him up, and he waved them all away with the biggest grimace.

Lovely fete, was Token and Wendy's wedding reception. I brought Kyle as my plus-one. I considered bringing the boy I was seeing, but there's something that's truly disgraceful about toting along the boy you're currently fucking to the wedding party of the man you used to fuck. He was dismayed about it, we had angry sex one last time and he left me. Never heard from him again, but that's how it goes.

"Well, come on then. At least tell me _something_."

"I don't know." I scratched my head. "You tell me. What could possibly possess Kyle to keep screwing around with old Clyde like this?"

She groaned. "Not about Kyle, Stanley! I don't care about him." She must have seen my expression, because she added, "Oh, I'm sorry. But I don't! All right? Just give it a week or two and Clyde will get scared off by his clinginess like the rest of them."

"But that's the problem," I moaned. "It's not some respectable bloke, it's old _fucking_ Clyde. He's too pathetic to leave, isn't he? Kyle's finally got the upper hand this time, doesn't he?"

"I don't know, what do you want from me? I'll say some nasty things about Kyle the next time Token brings Clyde over, if you like. I'll say you've told me he has genital warts or something."

"They've done it already. If Kyle had genital warts, Clyde would already know. And besides, you'd enjoy that too much, spreading falsehoods about Kyle."

"I wouldn't enjoy it at all!" she protested. "Don't you see? I don't care a whit about damn Kyle, all right? His only significance to me is how you feel about him, Stanley, and if there had been some progress on this front in 15 years we could discuss it but as for what he sees in _Clyde_ it's none of my concern, all right?"

I rolled my eyes. "Ah, Wendy."

"_Ah_ what?" She sipped some tea. "I'm sorry, darling, but that's just how it goes sometimes." She set her teaspoon down daintily; I always admired the way she stuck her pinky out when she drank. It was so unlike the way everyone else I knew did it. Wendy was a lady, and she had been forced to sit through the formal etiquette lessons we middle class schoolboys were thankfully spared back in the day. Her posture was refined, ankles locked in a cross. She was trying to keep her high breeding concealed, and yet it betrayed her. One can only glean so much about how to naturalize in with the common folk at school. Tea-taking is often bred, not learned.

"Not much to say about the boy. I'm telling you, really. He's blond, he's Irish, he's got some slightly mangled teeth, if you look closely. Seems to have a nice sense of irony about the whole thing. Is this was you wanted to know?" I sighed, and pushed my thick veil of bangs back. It was time for a cut, I knew it, and yet I took no delight in the queer passion of maintaining one's own hairstyle; Kyle did enough of that for the both of us. I was fussy about my hair vicariously through him. Perhaps I could color it, but there wasn't a great deal I could conceive of doing to it by way of cutting.

"I think the blond catamite model is in this season, really. First Craig turns up with one, then I run into that miserable drug dealer fucking one against the sink in the loo, and now Eric's got one as well."

"I think maybe you should go out and get a blond boy," Wendy told me with a straight face. I could tell she wasn't joking. "You'd look great next to one."

"I had my blond boy once," I reminded her.

"Oh, yes, Gary." Her cheeks reddened. "Gary, right."

"Right." She gave me a pitiful look, and to punish her, I asked, "So, speaking of men who do not love us. How are things going with your husband?"

She raised her hand, and for just a moment I was sure she was about to give me a dirty gesture, but instead she bit her bottom lip slightly before sighing. "Do you know, I think they are not horrible."

"Well, that's good."

"Oh, yes, it's fine." She blinked and shook her head, but she seemed lost in a daze, her thoughts elsewhere. "It's perhaps too much to dare say you were helpful, but…" She swallowed. "I think we're working on it." Swallowing, her fingers absently found the twisted handle on her china teacup. It was a Wedgwood service in navy and gold, a fat band of decoration running along the rim. I fondly recall going with her to Selfridges to pick out the pattern. She had been effortlessly pleased, glowing without rouge at the excitement of planning a wedding to a man she was very well aware would never grow to love her the way I'm sure she did not realize she would eventually desire. I pronounced almost every pattern hideous until we got to this one, asking to see gravy boats and then gasping at the lightness of china of this quality, because it was all some stupid game to us then. The salesman was wearing a hideous yellow shirt, and he looked down his nose at her and with his canines bared in lechery at me. I blew him in the men's room while she had a salt beef sandwich downstairs. We bought a box of Charbonnel et Walker truffles to share over drinks that night, and left arm-in-arm, much the way we used to walk along the river back at university. The way her freshly manicured talons clicked against the rim of the teacup brought this back to me.

She walked me out, which wasn't usual, and I wondered why until we reached the mammoth front door, where she paused, and very carefully said, "I shan't be seeing you next week, dear. Unfortunately I've got to go out to see my mother." Wendy's parents lived in a manor house in the Cotswolds. They had a townhouse in the city, which they seemed to frequent when we were in university, but I suppose in the ensuing years they'd decided they preferred country living to the metropolitan pleasures London had to offer. She took me once over an Easter holiday, and I was dismayed to find that it wasn't particularly Brideshead-ish at all; her parents got on quite well, there were no siblings to create pathos. Tey seemed to be only the most cursory of Anglicans, and did not give me and my Catholicism (or lack thereof) any prompts to discussion.

"So don't show up here next week expecting tea sandwiches, as I won't be in town," she seemingly concluded. After a short pause so she could swallow, though, she added, "But Token will be here, of course, so do feel free to pay him a little visit." And then she rolled her eyes.

"Token not invited?" I asked, ignoring her jab.

She shook her head. "Oh, no. Well, he's welcome, you know, but Token and Daddy haven't gotten on since forever, it seems. They're so bitter toward each other, and the odd thing is that there really isn't any reason why. I suppose it's territorial, to pick at small wounds in the relationship between oneself and one's in-laws."

"Well, thank god I haven't got any in-laws."

"Yes, you should feel so lucky you're gay."

"Excuse me," I said, "but isn't _Token_?"

"I suppose." She shrugged her shoulders. "But it's really not the _same_, is it?"

"No," I said before departing. "I suppose it's not."

XXX

I had not spoken to Kyle, and an unsettled feeling began to permeate my routine, if one could call it that. After I left Wendy and Token's I swam, and the next day I returned to the pool for more laps. In the shower, I noticed an older gentleman — although he could not have been too much older than I — cruising me, and willingly went back to his flat, which was in Bayswater, and not so far from Kyle's. On my walk back to the Tube, I really did have half a mind to turn left instead of right and go bang on his door and ask him why he would not return my phone calls. I tried to reassure myself with the idea that it might not have been personal. I wanted so badly to run into old Clyde and just give him a good, swift kick right in the crotch. For every ounce of disgust and fury I felt toward him, however, there was an equal amount of pity. The idea that Kyle hated him intrigued me, and yet it frustrated me. If he was willing to just shack up with anyone, why not me?

Thoughts swirled around me as I walked and sulked, eventually popping into a pub for a drink, which I rudely swished around in my mouth as I wondered just what I was doing. The man I had just fucked had given me his number, but I hadn't enjoyed it much — I was just going through motions, distracted. Feeling lousy, I went home and read until the early hours.

On Thursday, I awoke with renewed optimism for no good or apparent reason. I made myself poached eggs and a rasher of bacon, and greedily ate while I poured over a week-old copy of the Guardian. Absurdly, the top editorial was lambasting Sheila Broflovski's censorship bill as "pitiful and timid." If only they knew the lady — she was nothing of the sort.

I showered, dressed, ate a digestive and, feeling antsy, decided to take a walk down to the coffee shop nearby with the seedy toilet. A lazy half-erection brewed in my jeans as I walked, thinking about what sort of man I might like to meet there. He should be shorter than I with large hands, and a tight, hairless scrotum. I hummed in appreciation of my own capacity to conjure these things as I walked. Before going into the loo, I bought a latte, and sat down in a battered armchair to scan the crowd. Mostly business types today — some spillover from the City, possibly. I resigned myself to patience and sipped my coffee slowly, inspecting the packages of various customers. Nothing caught my eye.

Things could have been worse, of course; I might have been drinking stale American tea with no character. This was fine; I could stand to sit by my lonesome for a bit while I waited to see who came into the shop. I was hard, but not so hard that I was desperate for release right away. If I had a more typical line of work, would I have been the sort to run to a coffee shop on my lunch break?

Kyle wasn't that type; he preferred to keep his sex within the confines of long, drawn-out, tumultuous affairs. Eric, as far as I knew, had been acting out of character when he picked up that boy in the loo at the London Stock Exchange. He was an insurance underwriter, actually; he often boasted about how the Jews he worked with were dependent on his services to run their businesses. I don't know what attracted him to that line of work but if he had ever seduced a man in the toilet — provided he were able to — he would have told us. Miss B kept to herself. I didn't often internalize it, but I was alone in my proclivity.

After a second latte, I gave up. No one I found particularly attractive had come in, except for a pair of businessmen I was positive were, against all odds, actually heterosexual. According to the clock on the barren brick wall I was facing, an hour of my life had been lost to this fruitless activity. Sighing, I set my empty coffee cup back on the counter, wiped my lips with a paper napkin and left the shop. I accidentally bumped into a lady on her way in, mumbled an insincere _pardon_, and bent over outside the windows to tie my shoe. Over, under, and so on, until I noticed a shadow in front of me, and obviously someone was standing there. I could tell this person was male because he cleared his throat, and when I stood up I was shocked to discover it was Kenny.

"Oh, hello." I was trying not to sound all that thrown. "Fancy meeting you here."

"Oh, there's nothing fancy about it," he said, flicking some ash from his cigarette onto the pavement; his other hand was poised on the jutting angle of his cocked hip. "Just tricks as usual, I'm afraid."

"Tricks?" I asked. "What tricks?"

"Oh, you know." He took a massive inhale on the end of his cigarette, and exhaled when he said, "The ones I turn for a living?"

"Yes, I know. One doesn't forget a detail like that. And yet … I thought you were exclusive with Eric, or something. Shouldn't you be bothering him?"

"I don't follow him to work. What would I do while he's busy all day?"

It hadn't occurred to me that the logistics of the arrangement were loose — Eric liked to have a very tight reign on things. "Well, I don't know, what _would_ you do all day? Sit under his desk and blow him?"

"Did it! Got neck cramps." He took my elbow. "Come on, Stanley. Let's have a walk." Dutifully, I followed, and not before shaking his hand from my elbow.

XXX

I didn't know where we were going.

"What brings you out here?" I asked as we strolled past a butcher, and a second-hand clothing shop.

"Well, I've been living not too far from here," he reminded me. "Besides, all the businessmen who come over at lunchtime are usually pretty horny."

"Not today," I told him. "I've just spent an hour in that coffee shop and didn't get one interested glance."

"It's their problem, not yours." He paused for a moment to check himself out in a storefront window, preening as he shuffled the locks of his dirty hair around. In tight-fitting, light-blue denim trousers and a threadbare T-shirt, he seemed either a runaway attempting to look respectable, or a bourgeois poseur attempting to look punk. I knew it was a bit of both, but perhaps his clientele hadn't any idea. I wondered what Eric thought, or if Eric actually cared. I assumed he didn't.

"But really, what are you _getting_ out of it?" I asked around the time we'd walked a kilometer, not marveling at the way this question was so familiarly posed to a boy I had met only once before.

He did not flinch at my investigations; he offered me answers without hesitation. "I'm earning a salary as his personal assistant," he explained. "So technically I'm his live-in help, and the rest is supplementary. I mean, the way he's explained it, whatever happens between an employer and an employee just happens. It's not illegal, and with valid employment over here I can get a passport."

At this my eyes went wide. "You want to naturalize?"

"Yeah, 'course I do. What do I wanna be Irish for?"

"Because that's your home, dear. Because that's who you _are_."

"Nah. Home's where you make it, really, and I've left that behind. I wanna exercise all my rights and shit. You know, it'd be nice to vote."

"To vote?" I laughed. "Essentially you are shacking up with Eric because you think he's going to provide you with a legitimate job that will enable you to get an British passport and _vote_?" It just seemed ludicrous to me.

"No, not just!" He halted in front of a cherry-red post box with the curvaceous letters _GR_ crowned triumphantly. "Voting is important to me!"

"That's … something. It's odd; it's quite odd. Do you know, I'm 37 and have yet to cast a ballot in a single election?"

He frowned, and kicked the post box with the heel of his tatty trainer. "Well, that's despicable. Don't you care?"

"Yeah, I care, but I care in the abstract." I sighed. "Look, Kenneth—"

"Kenny's fine," he reminded me.

"_Kenny_. Dear. I know you are a prostitute, but perhaps you're not properly jaded yet. All elections are essentially between two candidates you cannot stand: A self-important ponce, and a complete wanker. It's just Labour squabbling with the Tories, over and over again. Who needs it? I just let the pieces fall where they may."

"But you could impact something!"

"Unlikely."

"Do you even know who your MP is?"

I realized I didn't. "Oh, it must be someone. I know it's not Kyle's mother."

"Who is Kyle's mother?" he asked as we passed by a homeless woman sitting on top of a pile of rags.

"Her name is Sheila Broflovski. She's a Labour MP, for North Islington. I only know because of Kyle, really. He's always lived in London, and when I met him at school I thought he was the most glamorous boy I'd ever met. He knew all about the government and actually had been to all the places we read about in old books during our course of study. I'd never been to London until the first summer after a year at university, actually, when Kyle took me home for the summer." Kenny gave me an incredulous look. "Well, all right, I suppose my family went once or twice to see something at the British Museum. But, honestly, for an academic, my father doesn't much like culture. As a geologist I think his interest has always been captured by the Iron Belt. If we were going to go to the city, we'd go up to Birmingham."

"Your father is a geologist?" He raised his eyebrows. "What the fuck is that?"

"Someone who studies rocks."

"Is that important?"

"Alas, no. No, it's not important."

"What's his name?"

"Professor Randy Marsh, D. Phil., Oxford, 1937."

"What's a dee-fill?"

"It's the highest academic certification a person can receive."

"You got one?"

I laughed. "Me? No. It's not a very useful degree. Certainly not in English literature."

"Seems like school is a big waste to me." He was digging into his pocket for his packet of cigarettes, and fiddled around with it while he spoke: "At the end of the day the best thing to do is something that impacts other people. Politics is good. Even whoring is good. You know? I never heard of your father. sorry. No offense. But I most certainly know who Sheila Broflovski is."

I stopped walking in front of AN empty storefront. "How the hell have you heard of Sheila Broflovski?"

Kenny rolled his eyes. "She's just about the most vocal member of the opposition."

"Yeah, she's a fascinating woman," I conceded. "I lived with her for a summer, you know."

"Well, of course I didn't know before you just mentioned it. What was _that_ like?"

"Ah, well." I had to think for a moment about what to say. "I don't know, it was summer, and she seemed just like any other woman to me, except she was American, and my friend's mother. She cooked dinner every night and nagged us a bit, like she wasn't sure if she should encourage us to go out and see the city, or keep us huddled in the house protected against her bosom, which is substantial. She … oh, I guess the best word for her is 'maternal.' But they have a very nice house, the Broflovskis. Have you ever been up to Islington?"

"I don't even know _where_ that is."

I thought about telling him, but was tiring of supplying him with easy answers. "Look at a map," I snapped.

So, again, he was smoking, and we were halted on the street, not so far from my flat, and there were boarded up windows all around us, intricately and obsessively layered in what I often overheard the young artists who lived nearby me referring to as 'street art' — a ridiculous inflation of what was essentially vandalism, not that I minded a bit of vandalism, but generally I found it appealing on a much less visible level.

The smoke from his fag was pinching the back of my throat, and I was about to request that he stop exhaling right into my eyes lest I fall over into respiratory-related convulsions. But, surprisingly, he said, "That's what I think I like about you, Stanley. You're accommodating, but you don't give anyone an inch on anything unless it's for that ginger who looks at you like you're Jesus and he'd like to choke on your balls simultaneously."

"Well, how the hell would you know?" I asked, legitimately. "This is the second time we've met in less than a week."

"You learn how to read people when you basically have to do it for a living."

"Oh, right, you're a _prostitute_," I sneered. "Right, I missed that the first 70 times. You should be less subtle about it, perhaps, dear, if you want to go someplace with it."

And to this, he burst out laughing. "You're a nearly 40-year-old unemployed queen living by himself in the fucking council estates with a bunch of artists half your age." He took a final drag on his cigarette, and tossed it behind his shoulder before taking a step back to squash it into the damp pavement. Then he lurched forward, grabbed my collar, and hissed, "And I find it fucking sexy."

I swallowed as his lips rubbed against my cheek. "To be fair it's not a council estate, and I'm not unemployed but rather self-employed."

"Like it matters." I felt his tongue against my lips, and pushed him away. "What?" he asked. "What the fuck is wrong with you?"

Truly, nothing much was wrong with me; I was certain my erection wasn't outwardly visible through my trousers anyway. "You _cannot_ do that on the street."

"I do it on the street whenever I like," he said. "What's the matter? It's not like Eric's around."

"Oh, bugger Eric!"

"Yeah, I've already done, thanks."

I rolled my eyes. "Even if it weren't illegal to have sex on the street, Kenny, this is a working-class neighborhood, and it's still fairly likely that some aggressive bloke will wander down this way and put his boot through your arse and mine. This isn't the West End and even there one _still_ shouldn't go around humping gaily in public. And let us not forget the police, dear, for all _gross indecency_ is still largely illegal outside of one's own home."

"Well, then." He shrugged his shoulders. "Let's go back to your place before you kill the mood any further."

XXX

It does not take an English bachelor's to determine what happened next. With very little pretense, I took him back to my flat, and before I had even managed to bolt the door, he was on top of me, grinding his crotch against mine with a refreshing ferocity. There was something innocent in his lips that I could not identify, an undue anachronism I hadn't expected to encounter in a prostitute. Obviously he was practiced, but then, Gary aside, when was the last time I'd actually fucked a virgin? We were all schooled in this art, trained by older tutors who could easily have taken degrees in this if they'd offered it in school. His hands were knowing, tightening on the flat, rough nipples under my shirt like he had mapped them before; his hips he presented against mine in mimicry of our kissing, only harder and more focused.

But it was his lips I might have fallen in love with, had I been about 20 years younger and terribly naïve. The scabby cracks stroked the moisturized contours of my jaw knowingly. It was indescribable, the way we kissed and kissed and shed clothing en route to the loft. At the bottom of the stairs we untangled our tongues and a viscous pillow of spit fell gracelessly onto his T-shirt.

On the long wall of my flat, in between the doors to the multitude of smaller catacomb-like rooms in which I had been storing rubbish for my father and old papers, I had hung a number of photographs. I did not look at them very often, and in many cases I did not remember framing them or putting them on the wall. I went through fits and spurts of sentimentality, and always had done ever since I was a boy.

Kenny was kissing my neck, lips barely brushing the uneven line where pricks of stubble had begun to emerge after shaving the previous evening. I in a haze of ecstatic lasciviousness slapped a hand against the wall for balance, and knocked off a picture frame — a sterling behemoth enrobed in Corinthian coils of nondescript ivy, vines meant to mock the idea of ivy, but a six-leafed variety that matched no species I'd ever met. A picture of my parents on their wedding day clattered face-up with a crack down the middle, slicing my mother's dour expression in two.

"Oh, bother," I muttered, feeling the words butt up against my swollen tongue. I tried to wipe it off, but being so drunk on youth and my own potency I fumbled a bit, and Kenny smiled at me. I nudged the damaged portrait with my shoe.

"Bed, Stanley," he said wickedly, with a cocked half-smile. "Take me to bed."

Well, when a 23-years-or-younger lad demands that you take him to your bed, what sort of idiot denies _that_? Upstairs, I hit my elbow on a side table as he was fumbling off his knickers, yellow Y-fronts painfully discolored. "Come on," he taunted. Nearly straddling me, his cock unfurled out into the daylight streaming through the dust on my two-storey windows, shorter and fatter than I imagined it, and quite hairless. I think my mouth must have been hanging open, because he lunged over and put his tongue in again while I regretted not taking a longer peek at the equipment. Every surface of my body felt tense, expanded, immense. It is amazing the way passivity allows one to notice the machinations of his own body during sex.

There was a lot of kissing and wriggling and shifting of weight while everything was painfully slowly assembled. I was dying for it, just thirsting for the sensation of plunging into his arse, but first I pushed his little behind away from my cock, where it had been trembling as it hovered just a few centimeters away, to slip on a rubber.

"Oh," he said, wiping his mouth, fingers tensed. "What have you gotta do that for?"

"It's just something you do," I managed to choke out as the tight, rubbery ring glided past poorly defined veins.

"But I don't like it." He took one of my hands, the hand that wasn't rolling on the condom, and placed it on his hip. "Don't you want to feel this?"

In lieu of verbal reply, I grabbed him around his waist, and kissed him a bit more, until both of us were gasping and saliva was everywhere again. So I used some of that to rub into his entrance. While I was doing it, he distracted me with a well-placed tongue to my collarbone, and deftly rolled the rubber back off in one fluid stroke.

"Give me lube," he commanded. "What do you use?"

I handed him a small tube. "I don't know, this is fine," I said, kissing his knuckles. "I bought it at some absolutely indecent place in Soho."

"Smells like mint," he commented. His erection was drooling across my abdomen, and I was sucking the tips of his brief fingers so that I was nearly kissing his nails. "Don't you use petroleum? One figures that's the standard. I don't got a lot of clients who use fancy shit or something. Often it's just spit."

"You always talk this much?" I flipped him over onto his belly — or, rather, I coaxed him with hesitant pressure from the palms of my hands, and he willingly submitted. "Why don't we just fuck?" I rasped into his ear. I had a stifling hard-on pressing into the small of his back, and all I could think about was how passively unbothered he was by this situation. I suppose, it's true, he was a whore, and meeting a man on the street (outside a cruisy coffee shop, no less) and ending up in his bed in short order must have been nowhere outside the boundaries of the usual. Still, he was not begging for it from me — just lying there with his head turned on the pillow of his arms.

"All right, do it already." His voice rang with optimistic impatience. It made me even harder, or at least it felt that way. With a final latching of my lips to the back of his neck, I ground my cock against the back of his thigh.

"I've never fucked a whore before," I panted, angling into position.

"Oh, shit." I felt his cheeks clench around my cock. "Then this is your big chance, isn't it?"

"Have I been missing out?" My nose trailed his hairline, so that I was speaking against the base of his skull.

"Well, I don't know. I've never fucked a prostitute either."

"Oh, masturbation doesn't count?"

"No, masturbation does not count."

XXX

I did not notice the clock while we were fucking, but by the time we had finally spent ourselves, the sun was low enough in the sky to illuminate the loft of my bedroom, and indeed the entire flat, in vibrant yellow splendor. It was that perfect pitch of seemingly divine light through my Romanesque windows that drew me to this space. When the realtor had showed it to me years before, calling it a 'conversion' with a dour look on his face as if he were insulted to even have it listed, I was won over by the idea that only 80 years before scores of indebted Victorian laborers sat in rows at smoke-belching machines while the windows were their only chance to glimpse the outdoors in daylight.

"What used to be made here?" Kenny asked, glancing around the apartment. He obviously hadn't done so while we were fucking, but I did not mind that he was singularly focused — he'd have to be good at this to make a living off of it. Likewise, I had actually come twice, which was a feat I hadn't managed in some time. Most men I'd been with hadn't really possessed the patience to lie there and continue fucking after the initial release; Kenny had coaxed more out of me. To say the least, I was utterly limp with exhaustion. Still, I felt plenty glad about it.

Finally realizing he'd been speaking to me, I muttered, "Oh, I don't know," because I was too numbed by my own afterglow to begin explaining the curious and extinct permutations of my home.

"Let's go downstairs," he said, sitting up slowly. I could see how stiff he felt, how gingerly he moved. He checked the backs of his thighs and the undersides of his forearms; it took me a moment, but I deduced that he was looking for bruises. "Come on." After slipping out of bed he tugged on my arm. "Let's get a beer. Come on, Stanley. Quit being lazy."

"Are you this impatient with Eric?" I asked.

"Oh no, he would whip me." How little he knew.

"Well, I haven't got any beer." I grabbed something that looked like an undershirt off the edge of my bed. I sniffed it; I must have shed it after my most recent swim. "I drink whisky, dear. That's my choice of beverage."

"You're so dreadfully old," he teased.

"Not too old to climax twice."

"Yeah, true." He trailed me down the staircase.

I poured him two cups, one of Famous Grouse and one of tap water. Not quite knowing what else to say, I asked him about his life with Eric.

"Oh, Eric is just so back-and-forth about the whole sex thing. He is in between being an utter lazy ass without the energy to will his penis to harden, and a grunting, feral sex pig who cannot help himself from drooling on me as we fuck. The things he is into are appalling, but like you already know, what's got money behind it is surprisingly easy to swallow. So to speak."

"Please don't tell me what he's got you swallowing," I said drolly.

He wrinkled his nose. "Very well." He took a gulp of whisky, finishing the glass. "I'm going to the loo. Where is it?"

I pointed him up the stairs, and sat at the table by myself with my head in my hands until he returned, dressed again, with his hands on his hips and a tough little look of satisfaction spread across his face.

"Tell me about the photographs," he commanded.

"You mean, the ones I've got on the wall?"

"No, the ones in your arse. Yeah, the ones on the wall."

"Oh, right, okay."

He dragged me over, tugging at my sleeve.

"What's this?" Kenny asked, picking up the cracked frame I'd left on the floor in a sex blind. "Is that your parents? When is this?"

"Well, yes, that would be my parents" I answered. "That would be 1940."

"Oh." He thought for a moment. "Your father didn't fight in the war?"

I laughed and shook my head. "Oh, my, no. He spent the entire war lecturing at Oxford. It worked out really well for him; practically the entire department died and he was promoted to a professorship. My uncle fought, though." I tapped on a square frame to the left of the space vacated by my parents' wedding photo. "This is my Uncle James and his batman, Edward — Ned for short." In the photograph, a well-fed man in a cap and vest bearing a rifle was flanked by a shorter, bespectacled fellow with dark hair. In black and white, and in military dress, you could not tell that I was related to my uncle at all. Indeed, as my father's half-brother, we shared few genes.

I took the picture from the wall and handed it to Kenny; he did not expect the frame to be heavy, but it was, and he sagged as he grasped it. I continued: "Ned lost his arm in the war, shot off at the elbow." As if he could not tell, I indicated this for Kenny on my own body, making slicing motions across the bend of my inner arm. "They lived together after the war ended for years."

"Don't they anymore? What happened?"

"Ned passed away, actually. Throat cancer."

"Oh." Kenny handed me back the photograph, and I stared at my reflection in the frame, my lips distorted where the reflection was skewed between the photograph and the matting. "I'm sorry."

"I was 19." Carefully I returned the frame to its habitat, surrounded by my parents at their wedding, me with my hands clasped in prayer on the morning of my first confessional, and my 17-year-old sister dressed as a bride, bone-colored carnations and yellow gerbera daisies hiding her pregnancy.

"I was very close to my uncle when I was growing up, I suppose. He was an avid hunter. When I was in school we had something of a falling out. I had a Rhodesian mix — the only wonderful thing my father ever bought me, this beautiful dog I would not let him castrate. His name was Sparky and he listened only to me. My uncle asked me if I would accompany him hunting, and bring Sparky, and I was delighted to go. But I didn't know — well, I knew, of course, but I couldn't imagine what it was like to watch an animal be ripped apart. I tried to call Sparky off the fox, and he listened to me, but Ned began to yell at me. So to defend me, Sparky jumped at Ned, and—" I sighed. "My uncle shot the dog."

"How horrible!" Kenny exclaimed. "Did he give any excuse?"

"Well, Ned just said, 'He was coming right for me,' but any responsible hunter knows a dog is only loyal to one man. Sparky loved me. At the time I assumed Uncle James was bloodthirsty, and accused him of such. In retrospect I know he was only defending Ned. It was panic."

"Oh. Were they … um—"

"We don't discuss that in the Marsh family," I snapped.

"Why, sorry," he said, in a tone that made it clear he wasn't terribly interested. He shrugged, and continued inspecting my photographs: school photos, me with mates I hadn't seen since I went up; Kyle and me at the Serpentine picnicking in the summer of 1965, which he did not ask about; and a shot of my class and our tutor, Garrison, in his rooms at the start of our final year. He peered at the pictures and said, "Is that…" He squinted harder at the photograph. "That couldn't be Kyle, could it?"

"It could," I answered.

"But he's so ... um, he hasn't, ah — what's wrong with his _nose_? It's fucking enormous!"

"Yeah." I nodded, and shut my eyes for a brief moment during which I recreated the scene Kenny was gazing at from memory, which I'd done a thousand times before, my early 20s having been full of wistful nights spent dwelling on pictures of young Kyle in his undergraduate glory. In my recollection of the photograph, there we were, grinning broadly — undoubtedly soused, on common pints of lager if not a pre-pose joint shared in someone's rooms. (Probably his — Kyle had a great window that looked out over an under-populated passage that year, and my room was far too centrally located to get away with letting the humble scent of marijuana settle into all of my belongings.) Kyle and I tilt toward each other, his freshly shorn locks bristling against my inky hair, the sweep of his black robe not obscuring his figure but augmenting it, fabric draping his cocked hip baroquely.

"Well, what happened?" Kenny's question drew me from my reminiscence. "Did he have his nose fixed or something?"

I sighed. How to answer? "Well, yes," I said, deciding tactful honesty was called for here. "But not quite intentionally. He … broke it."

"How?"

I crossed my arms. "Must you ask so many questions? This is my life, not the damned Tate."

"Why, would you rather I have no curiosity about _anything_? What's the point of displaying old pictures if not to compare and contrast the present with all of your friends' old noses?"

"Kyle is the only friend of mine with an old nose," I gritted. "And for your information, _dear_, Kyle's nose was broken by your friend Eric. Friend or john or employer, or all three. He threw Kyle into a door frame and broke his nose."

This didn't shock him in the least. "I sense there's not a lot of love between them, of course," he said. "But what on Earth would possess Eric to toss someone into a door?"

"Well, I don't know what would drive _anyone _to that sort of intense violence, but the brief answer is this: Kyle and Eric were — well, maybe 'dating' is the wrong word, but seeing each other, or something, and they had a quarrel and Eric attacked him."

"Oh."

"Oh?" I gaped at him. "All you can say is 'oh'?"

"What should I say? Would you like me to feign shock that Eric and Kyle slept with each other? I was caught between them at Camp on Saturday; I saw how they glared at each other."

"What does _that_ mean?"

"It means nothing."

"You're implying that you saw some light of attraction between them?"

"I'm implying nothing, except that I may have known Eric for only a few weeks now, but I refuse to believe that he would injure someone _unprovoked_."

"There's no excuse to beat someone! No provocation is enough to attack someone you profess to love."

"Tell that to my parents," he said. "And who was professing to love who, here? All I think is that it must be a bit more complication than that Kyle is a victim and Eric a nightmare."

"You impudent little _brat_! You don't know either of them."

"I know Eric."

"Fleetingly!"

He sighed. "I read people, Stanley. That is my sole skill. Obviously something happened to Kyle, because I can see him very clearly here and he had a different nose on Saturday." He tapped the picture. "But expecting me to believe that Eric would just attack someone for _nothing_ is ridiculous. He is too lazy, for one thing. I don't think he could lift someone to physically _throw_ them."

"But then he could," I corrected. "You think you know Eric, but he hasn't always been as he is now." I indicated 21-year-old Eric in the photograph, broad and muscular and so very handsome, grinning diabolically with the self-confidence of a young man who knows he is young and beautiful. "Believe me, he could have lifted poor Kyle clear over his head if he'd liked. He was a rower. But I'm sure since you've been living with him and he tells you everything you know that and all."

"_That_ is Eric?"

"Doesn't it look like him?"

He leaned closer into the picture, squinting. "If I were smart I'd refuse to believe it."

"Suit yourself."

He ripped himself away from the photograph. "He was so pretty!"

"You don't have to tell me; I knew him then. But yeah, he was. A horrible bastard, though. But we were all little bastards, I think." I ran my hand along the pane protecting the photograph. "This is Craig," I said, pointing to a dark-haired boy. He was couched between Clyde and Token. "Craig is really still a bit of a bastard. You'll want to watch out for him. Here's old Clyde, of course, like it matters; this is Token. I expect you'll meet him eventually. This is James, who passed away the year after this photo was taken. Muscular dystrophy. Me, of course, and Kyle, _of course_, and Eric, and Miss B." Young Butters was grinning broadly, knock-kneed under a cloak and a little pair of eggplant-colored corduroy shorts he'd sewn. It was riotous to think a boy would lurk around Oxford in drag in broad daylight then, but Butters had a way of pushing the envelope as far as the damn thing would budge.

"Oh, that's Butters," he said. "Okay, I just thought it was a girl at first."

"Our tutor didn't accept girls," I deadpanned.

"How Irish of him."

I shrugged.

"What are you all wearing?"

"Robes."

"How gay."

"Precisely. Are you done inspecting my personal life yet?"

He inched away, toward a photograph of me with a grinning towheaded fellow. "Who's this?"

I stood up straighter, pushed out my sternum, and answered, "That's Gary Harrison. He gave me syphilis," to which Kenny burst out snickering. I smacked his behind and said, "Oh, it isn't funny!"

"Just the delivery," he said, wiping away a tear.

"No, it isn't! It was horrible for me."

"So, what, you've just given me syphilis?" he asked. "If I had known I'd've let you use the rubber."

"No, of course I haven't given you syphilis. I had that cleaned up forever ago; it's all just antibiotics. But, yeah, generally if you want to avoid it, you protect yourself, which is what I've been _trying_ to do, but lord knows men are not often receptive to it."

"Well, it's certainly no fun. So. You left your last boyfriend over a venereal disease."

"No, that is not what happened at all!" He gave me a little come-on gesture, and I assumed this meant he wanted to know what _had_ happened. "He was a Mormon who had grappled with his homosexual feelings all his life, and he thought perhaps going on a mission and getting himself away from his horrible little backwater mountain town in Colorado and his family and all the rosy-cheeked rugged lads running around out there might cure him, but instead he met _me_, and I led him astray. And we loved each other, I know we did, but … well, if you'd gone your 25-odd years suppressing your own desires, you would hardly be ready to commit yourself to one bloke, either."

"Oh, Stanley, _please_. I can't even be _paid_ to commit myself to one man."

"Right," I agreed. "So he strayed, and I found out through the syphilis, and we had a marvelously frank discussion about what to do about it. So we agreed on an open relationship, although I would have liked it more monogamous, you decide these things in congress as a couple. And, a few months into _that_, his mother came to town."

"Because he _invited_ her?"

"No, because his mission was only to last three years, and when he didn't return home his family became incredibly worried."

"Oh, but the lack of communication over three years didn't bother them."

"Not really, no, because the missionaries aren't supposed to indulge in communication with persons back home."

"Sounds like a sticky situation."

I shook my head. "His missionary-related visa had run out, and it's not like we could have gotten married. He asked me to come to America with him, but I was too hurt. He told me he didn't want us to end it together, but I was angry. So, we couldn't last." I gestured to the photograph of us together again. "I don't like to think of myself as a cliché, whatever the case may be. He was not the only man I ever loved, and he was not even the only man I loved at that time. But I loved him and he loved me back at a time when I ached to settle down and be a couple. I'm sure life doesn't end at 40, but now I am simply fucking anyone who so much as gives me a flattering look while I'm paying attention. I suppose I can … well … oh, I'm not sure what I can and cannot do any longer. Suffice to say, I can move on from almost anything, save one thing."

He flared his nose at me. "And that one thing would be?"

No use lying about it, I figured. "Kyle."

As soon as I had said it, his eyes dimmed, and he frowned, tucking his lips together as if in deep thought.

"I have to get back," he said quietly. "I've got to meet Eric at the flat by the time he's done drinking. He wanted me to pick up some digestives, too, so I should probably do that."

"I have some digestives," I offered. "Chocolate ones, I think."

"Oh, you're kind to offer me your biscuits, aren't you?" He waggled his eyebrows at me. "But, no, I think Eric probably wants a fresh roll. He can eat several rolls in a sitting, did you know? It's amazing."

"I don't know that I find gluttony particularly amazing."

He brightened at this. "I find all sins and transgressions and stuff amazing, you know? Just doing it is so fantastic. Haven't you ever eaten an entire package of biscuits in a sitting? Didn't you feel a bit sick at the end? That feeling can feel really good, you know. It works with anything — anything bad, anyways."

"You mean, eat an entire roll of digestives? Yeah, can't say that I have. I imagine it'd feel awful."

He opened the door to my flat, and turned around to make his best dramatic exit: "Says the man who came two times this afternoon." He blew me a kiss and gave me a wink.

After watching the door slam shut, I picked up all the pieces of clothing I'd lost along the route from the door of my flat to bed. On the stairs I found my trousers, and sitting atop them, my wallet. It seemed odd to me that I should have removed my wallet whilst making out with a boy, so I opened the billfold, only to find it was devoid of all cash, having been emptied of its three 20-pound notes — 30 quid for each orgasm. Perhaps I was slightly disappointed, but I was hardly surprised. Not in the least.

XXX

I fucked him 11 more times over the next four weeks. Summer rolled along, rain splattering against my windows as we copulated madly, teeth sinking into lips and limbs pasted to sheets with a potion of sweat, petroleum jelly, and other remnants of sticky sex — seed and the froth of my best efforts to evoke a response from him other than a stupid, self-satisfied smirk at the end of a good afternoon's lay. Each time there were new bruises, teeth marks, the telling lines on strained flesh. Only once I said anything. "Being in someone's employ does not warrant abuse, you know," I reminded him, punctuating this sentiment with my tongue inside his ear, the byproduct of his last climax still dribbling from my lips.

He pushed me away, harshly, against the bed frame. "It's just rough is all," he argued. Kenny slipped out of bed, stumbling toward his pants — crisp, low-cut, brand-new navy-blue-with-white-trim briefs straight from Marks & Sparks; a five pack. With new bruises came new rewards. One week he kept his bills — some of which were originally mine — crumbled at the bottoms of his trouser pockets; the next, I spied a gilt bill clip emblazoned with the mammoth capitols E-T-C.

"And the rest of _what_?" I asked him.

"The rest of _who_," he replied.

"Et cetera," I pronounced, pronouncing the words to be perfectly clear. "It's Latin, dear. E-T-C."

"The rest of _nothing_," he snapped. "It's none of your damn business."

I took his chin in hand. "That unbecoming," I said, running a thumb along his jaw. I was glad he'd seemed to have gotten a haircut. He was shaving more, too; his stubble was so light it was difficult to tell, but one's lips upon a man's cheek can discern all sorts of sins. "I'm but concerned. You don't have to allow yourself to be, mmm … _manhandled_ … if it isn't what you want."

"Oh, but it is." He pushed my hand off of his face. "I don't need a man who's into sticking his tongue up my arse to be telling me what's becoming or not. I got a perfectly respectable life going, got it?"

I had no option but to reply, "Oh, _yes_," and witness him dress, style his hair with a wad of spit, and help himself to another 60 quid from my wallet, which he tucked into his billfold. I lay on the bed watching him do this until he came to me and kissed me closed-mouth on the lips — his were still scaly and dry, begging to be fixed.

"You're a great lover, Stanley," he said, handing me a shirt that was balled up on the floor. It stunk of chlorine and ashes. "But it's only fair to tell you that some men aren't looking for a great lover."

He flashed his incisors at me. They were quite pointy, almost supernaturally so, nearly vampiric, but there was also something off; they were crooked. It was lucky for him, I guess, that this wasn't readily apparent in a natural conversation.

"They're looking for a meal ticket?"

"Ha!" I did not like him to smoke in my apartment, but he produced a cigarette anyhow, and tucked it behind his ear. "You are a riot. Shall I tell Eric hello for you?"

"So long as you don't tell him I'm fucking you."

"Oh, I won't, as a precaution against my incurring some _unwanted_ bodily harm." I heard him chuckling to himself the whole way downstairs, and then I heard the door slam.

XXX

I got an assignment, through Wendy, to write a review of the Royal Opera production of Britten's _Death in Venice_ for the Independent. It happened she was a patroness of educational outreach at the opera house, and Token's father (in his capacity as captain for the EMI legal department, which was producing the soundtrack) had, at her suggestion, floated my number over to someone at the Independent looking for a writer who could capture something of the context of the opera, and whether it had been done any justice. Where Wendy got the idea that I had any inkling about Thomas Mann escaped me.

"I'm all but obligated to give it a favorable review. Why don't you just write the damn thing yourself?" I asked her. The pair of tickets to the opening night's performance had been presented to me on a silver tray, tied with a velvet red bow — perfect Wendian ironic idealism. I nearly spit out my mouthful of Westminster Afternoon Black laughing.

"I'm just the lowly patroness," she demurred. "You are the one who has a way with words."

"Just because you say it doesn't make it so."

"No, but believing it makes it valid," she noted. "Remember, Stanley. There are two tickets there." She gestured with her manicured talons in my face, peachy pink and shimmering in the daylight bouncing off her scalloped flatware. "Two."

"So you expect me to do, what, give one to an orphan? Take you?"

"Oh, hardly me. I've seen the damn thing six times in rehearsal. Take someone who deserves it. Take that boy, that nasty little boy. I think he might identify with the whole thing. Lord knows, I'm sure he wouldn't appreciate any foreign-language operas, so he'll never see _La Traviata_, and I don't think Eric would have a mind to take him to anything short of Wagner." She pronounced it with a critical Aryan growl, purring out _vogner _in a throaty tone I knew was meant to mimic Eric's, or what she remembered Eric's being from long ago.

I rolled my eyes. "Wagner _died_ in Venice, I think. I'm beginning to regret telling you anything of my sex life. Your bizarre seeming fixation on marrying me to a prostitute living with one of my friends — _barely _— has got to be making up for the absence of _something_ in your life."

When I said things like this, Wendy was often frustrated with me. This time, she smiled, and grasped my wrist while I was holding a chicken sandwich. "What I'm saying, dear, is this assignment is a strategic gift. If you have a particular fixation — a need to settle, if anything — please try to settle it. I want to hear more stories about disheveled sex with towheaded filthy-mouthed whores."

I pocketed the tickets; I left the ribbon on.

"Thank you, Wendy."

I kissed her hand, and she blushed.

XXX

Kyle had not returned any phone call of mine for the longest time. I would leave a message with his secretary, a girl with a high-pitched voice that reminded me of my sister's less academic-minded school friends from so long ago. "He is busy, but I can take a message," she would tell me. "I will make sure he calls you right back." He didn't. I was glad that at least he was paying his secretary good money for _something_, even if it was keeping me at bay.

But he showed up on Mondays, dutiful as ever, and entertained on Saturday evenings, eyeing Kenny with suspicion as he riffled through Kyle's coffee table books. On Saturday nights he would drink himself stupid, fumble around with old Clyde, and end up in the loo vomiting. As long as he was sleeping with Clyde I felt sick, and then on Monday evenings he would show up for a drink — which I would buy him — complain about how much he hated himself for giving his evenings over to someone he absolutely loathed, and then he would leave, excusing himself on a count of business before I could air _my_ grievances.

I didn't know exactly to what Wendy was referring when she implied that I might use the tickets she'd given me to do something meaningful _other_ than write a review of opening night, but without delay I called Kyle and left a message with the secretary. "Oh, just tell him I have opera tickets," I said breezily, feeling powerful as the words left my lips. "He doesn't have to call back; I'm sure he's busy."

"I will make sure he calls you right back," she said, as usual.

Not 15 minutes later the phone rang. I was sitting on my couch poring over the Guardian, and as soon as I heard him purr a brief _hello_ my heart began to pound and my cock sprang to life, my mouth began to water and I felt, well, sort of relieved, or reassured.

"What opera?" he demanded. "Please say it's not something in German," he said. "Or, for that matter, French. It still hurts too much. No French or German opera. But, what is it? I'm _dying_ to know."

"If you exclude all French and German opera you'll soon find yourself with very limited opportunities," I replied.

"I like Italian. I find it elegant. Please say it's _Cosi Fan Tutte_. I need something brassy; this entire week has just been a failure of the highest order, on all fronts."

I wondered what _that_ meant. "Well, it's not _Cosi_. But it's also not German or French. Actually, it's English; Britten's _Death in Venice_."

"Oh." He sounded unimpressed. "I've always found Britten highly overrated."

"Oh, me too," I lied. "But this is the opening night of the performance, you see, in Covent Garden. I've been asked to review it for the Independent — I don't know why, something to do with Wendy, and Token's father, as I've never _reviewed_ an opera before in my _life _— but nevertheless I have two tickets in the reviewers' box, and we can meet the cast after, if you like. Would you like?"

He was silent for a moment. "Well, I don't know," he finally said, after what seemed like a lifetime. "I'm a busy man."

"It's a Friday night, Kyle."

"How do you know I don't have plans?" he snapped. "I have a life! People need my attention! I haven't been to dinner at my mother's in three weeks and she's accused me of _hiding_ something from her — as if I have anything to hide! So why should I go to the opera with you? Besides the fact I like box seats."

"Because, Kyle, you've been a downright ass to me lately." I decided not to punctuate this with any further sentiment.

"Oh," he said. "I guess I have been."

"Do you want to come to the opera?" I repeated.

For a tense moment, he said nothing, but there was no discernable noise other than his breathing, so I knew he hadn't ended the call. My palms were sweating and my cock was throbbing in my pants. I wanted to pull it out, but I stopped myself, and asked, "Kyle, hello? _Death in Venice, _darling, you don't have to see it if you don't want to."

"No, I think…" His voice narrowed to a girlish whisper. "I think I'd enjoy that very much."

"Excellent." The metal teeth of the zipper on my trousers unlocked like jaws. I was very glad he couldn't see me blushing. "I'm _so_ looking forward to it."

XXX

"Do you know, the first opera we saw together was Britten?"

"_Gloriana_?"

"_Rape of Lucretia_, I think." Kyle shrugged. "Oh, who can remember?

It _had_ been _The Rape of Lucretia_, and I could recall the details of the performance to superfluous extent — Kyle in his aggressively shined loafers, hair neatly piled, threatening to fall over his ears with a slight jerk. My hair was bleached that morning in anticipation of a matinee. After, we went to the Duke of Buckingham for the first time, having overheard two camp gentlemen discussing the place in the line for concessions at intermission, where I bought Kyle a glass of acidic red wine that left a stain on his lips. I thought it looked romantic, so I didn't tell him. That entire summer was an extended date in my hopes, anyhow, and we were proud of ourselves for decoding the subtle differences in inflection, in flourishes — following the clues tacked onto the end of _fab_ until it was _fabulosa_. (It was Miss B who introduced us to the lingua, actually, two terms previous.)

I didn't tell Kyle he was correct about Britten; I let him wonder, confident via my own assessment that he knew just as well as I did. Intermission at the opera was a chance to look over my notes, but I didn't really care to, and the notebook with bitchy scribbles all over it sat at my feet in the box. Kyle bought his own wine this time, but didn't ask me if I wanted anything. From on high we surveyed the crowd on the main floor.

"My god." Kyle clasped his free hand to the balustrade. "Stanley, do you see this? There's a lady down there with the most garish wig I have ever seen in my life."

"Worse than your mother's?" I asked.

"Oh my god, I think that _is_ my mother."

This got me to peer over the balcony.

"What are you doing?" He yanked me back. "Don't let her _see_ you."

"Why not?" With pink cheeks the wine staining his lips looked especially pretty. I grinned at him. "I haven't seen your mother in some time."

"I told her I was dying of pneumonia." He set his wine down next to my notebook. "That was the only way I could get out of dinner."

"You know, if you were busy, you didn't have to come."

"I wanted to! Oh my god, I hope my _father_ isn't with her. The last thing I'd like is for him to catch me _lying_. I'd never hear the end of it. Since when does my mother go to the _opera_ on her own volition? Oh, _god_, she's not going to want to talk to me about _Death in Venice_, is she? Am I going to have to tell her I actually know a male prostitute?" He leapt up.

"What are you doing?"

"What does it look like I'm doing?" He slipped into the seat behind me. I had to remember to ask Wendy why the reviewer's box at opening night was vacant aside from me, my notebook, and Kyle. "I'm putting as much distance between Mom and myself as possible! It'll be even worse if my father catches me; one of his looks can cut right through me. I definitely have to go to dinner next weekend. This is me being punished, for trying to enjoy myself."

This was the point when I reluctantly decided to go join him a row back. I brought my notebook and handed him his wine. I sighed. "Darling, I really don't think it matters if your mother figures out you went to the opera instead of dinner. I mean, _she_ is here, isn't she?"

"She's only here because I stood her up," he moaned.

Kyle spent the rest of the performance moping, slouched in his seat, making dissatisfied sighs through the final curtain call. It wasn't a wonderful production on the main stage, but Kyle's extended drama entertained me enough while I scribbled things about staging and Mann's link between romance and death. At the bottom of my notes, as the audience stood clapping, I scrawled in capital letters _SONTAG_ and put the cap back on my pen.

"Quickly," Kyle hissed, jumping to his feet. "Before we're noticed." We slipped out without incident.

XXX

We escaped to the Bucky, naturally, the scene of many post-opera evenings.

"I doubt Wendy is going to like what I have to say about this thing," I said. "The performers were well enough, but what is the point of doing a retrospective on Britten? The whole thing reeked of the self-congratulatory."

Sipping from a pint of cider, Kyle grimaced. "I don't care about the opera at all, really. The whole thing was just ruined for me. I prefer to keep the homoerotic and my mother out of the same space if at all possible. Something else I'll never enjoy again. Is there wine on my lips?"

"No."

"Very well. Ugh, I cannot believe she was at the opera!"

"Darling, let it go." I led us to a booth in the quietest part of the pub, which was gradually filling. "The worst thing you can do is obsess over it." I knew how ironic my words must have sounded. I didn't much care.

"The last time I saw my father he guilted me for an hour about the fact that I never give my time to synagogue charity projects, and I told him that I just wrote a check to support runaway queer youths. He found this inadequate and switched to lecturing about how I don't speak on the telephone often enough to my brother."

"The last time _I _saw _my_ father—"

"Let me guess, he made you feel like a lazy degenerate ingrate?"

I snorted. "Or something."

"Well, okay, so let's toast to our fathers." And we did. Kyle set his glass down. "I'm fucking starving. Do you want anything?"

Not from the Bucky, I didn't. "Could do with some crisps," I said with a shrug.

About 15 minutes later Kyle returned to the table with a packet of vinegar crisps he unceremoniously dropped in my lap, and a plate of over-toasted welsh rarebit garnished with baked beans, soggy bright-red tomatoes, and three links of stout sausage.

"Are you really going to eat all that?" I asked, as he shoved a tablespoon of beans into his mouth. "We could go have some real food, you know. Wouldn't it be fitting to follow up _Death in Venice_ with something suitably posh?"

He swallowed before answering: "Fine, we'll do that too. I have a theory that if I make myself enormously fat old Clyde will stop coming by at 2 in the morning for surreptitious little visits, if you take my meaning."

"I take it," I said, but I didn't want it, and to let him know this I rolled my eyes and tried to scrunch my mouth up so I looked ill.

"I fucking hate him. I didn't used to; I used to just think he was boring." Kyle paused to shove half a sausage into his face, and wash it down with amber-colored, fizzy cider. "But every time I let him up and he fucks me and just falls asleep afterward and I'm left unable to sleep in my own bed because this socially awkward _man_ is there, drooling on my shoulder. It makes me a bit sick to my stomach. Well, and then I get sad. But I can't stop sleeping with him. What would I do with myself otherwise?"

_Me_! I wanted to scream. _Do me me me me me!_ But instead I just sighed. I grabbed his hand. How to get him to stop this? "Kyle, you have to stop leading him on."

"Oh, I am not leading him on. This is very clearly all about sex."

"What if it isn't merely all about sex for him? What if he likes you, truly likes you?"

"I don't like him."

"Ah, you're just being difficult. At least _try_ to spare his feelings, if he's got them."

"Stanley, I don't care if he's got them or not. Let me tell you something: Even if he _did_ like me — and even if I liked him — that man is so deep in the closet it's absolutely unbelievable. I don't know if he likes me or like-likes me or whatever first-form way you want to put it, but I really can't abide by indulging in a relationship with a man who is still in the closet in 1982."

I nodded, because I sympathized.

"Lord knows, I'm _36_," he hissed, like the number was filthy. "My assets are wasting away. Every time I let old Clyde fuck me, I wish it were actually building toward _something_. I'm never going to be married, never — not as long as _this_ keeps happening."

"Perhaps you should stop looking for a husband and start looking for a _wife_," I suggested.

"Oh, really." He snorted. "Because everyone I know with a _wife_ is so _happy_." A pregnant pause. "I'd try it, _really_, but I don't think I'm physically capable of it. So I'd rather not waste the time." He looked to me for a response, but when he didn't get one, he just slathered some beans on toast and forked a chunk of it into his mouth. I waited while he chewed. "Do you think he'd notice if I put on a stone? Maybe I should, just to test him."

"No, don't do that." I grabbed Kyle's wrist, which was mid-hoist, a forkful of toast and tomato halfway between the plate and his lips. "You just need to stop sleeping with Clyde, darling. Sorry. He's utterly dreadful."

"I know!" He freed his wrist from my grasp and dropped his fork. "But I can't until I have someone else lined up."

"Why have anyone lined up at all?" I asked.

"I don't like to _cottage_, Stanley. I like to _make love_ and you know it." What a perfectly bitchy thing to say.

"Because you and Clyde are so _in love_ it's like a storybook."

He just glared at me, mouth hanging open, and I didn't know if he was going to cry or continue his recent trick of storming out of dinner or give me some kind of dressing-down. Instead, he shut his mouth and put his head in his hands and moaned, "You're right, I know you're right."

Well, of course I was. But how to make him stop sleeping with Clyde altogether? "You know," I began, trying to think faster than I could speak. "There is something to be said for, you know, sort of … abstaining … for a bit."

He looked up at me, sniffling, and wiped his eyes (they _were_ a little teary) on his sleeve. "You mean, like, be celibate."

"Something like that, I suppose."

"I could try it, perhaps, but…" He sighed. "I'm 36."

"I know."

"I don't have a lot of time to mess about."

"What does that mean?"

"It means my looks aren't going to last forever, and—"

"Darling, you're gorgeous." I got up and sat next to him in the booth; he melted into me, and I reached for my drink from across the table. Against my cheek his short hair felt rather foreign. "Kyle, Kyle. Why don't you entertain for a bit the idea of being with a fellow who doesn't require that you jump into bed with him?"

"I don't like being single," he reminded me, as if such a thing were necessary.

I kissed his temple. "Someone who loves you doesn't care if you sleep together. He'll want you all the time, not simply at 2 in the morning."

"This sounds like something my mother would say," he groaned.

I shuddered. "Apologies."

After a few minutes of just sitting together, he pushed away from me. "Thank you for taking me to the opera," he said. "I can't wait to read your review."

"Oh, and I can't wait to write it," I sang. Kyle snickered. The production was a joke and Wendy was going to hate me for skewering it. But it had gotten things back on track with Kyle, and this was almost all the consolation I needed.

XXX

At a quarter to 3, I was awoken by the phone. In the fog of struggling for consciousness I hoped whoever was on the line would simply tire of trying to get a hold of me and hang up. But this was apparently not going to happen, and as the damn ringing noise penetrated my bedroom a 15th and 16th time I shrugged off the covers, and the softened pages of my worn-edged copy of _Goodbye to Berlin_. I had written until about midnight, banging at the keys with a fury I hadn't known since I had been last charged with the heavy summertime spirit of youth and debauchery. The sad thing was, I hadn't even known what I was writing or intending to write; words just came and I transcribed them. I'd meant to be reviewing the opera, but all that came out was raw feeling.

A glass of whisky had sat next to me at the table, and occasionally I knocked it with my elbow, but I neither drank from it nor moved it out of the way. Somewhere, I developed the urgent idea that perhaps I could push the glass across the table and avoid knocking it over, but as I wrote and wrote I had realized that words, if not ideas, were coming to be in a freeform jumble like they hadn't in forever, and if the cost of indulging my own creativity was having to clean up a spill, I'd better pay the price. For that matter, if I had knocked the glass over, I probably wouldn't have cleaned it anyhow. On the fading edges of this surge I decided to grab a book when I found myself sinking and climbed upstairs to bed. Now it was very late, or very early; the Isherwood had fallen off my face, the lamp was still on, and I was going to have to pick up the phone.

"What?"

"Stan, hello," a rickety female voice greeted me. "I'm so glad you picked up. Is it late there?"

"It's 3 in the morning," I said. "Who is this?"

"It's Mrs. Harrison, dear." She paused, and her voice hitched while recognition dawned on me: "You know, Gary's mother?"

"Yes," I said, sitting up straighter. "Hello."

"How are you, Stan?"

It wasn't an unexpected question, and yet there was so much I could tell her. 'I'm utterly fabulous,' I could answer. 'Since your son left me I've fucked just about everything in Britain with testicles, and even a few blokes who were missing one. I doubt Mormonism would approve of all this willy-nilly sodomy. And how are you?' Or: 'Things are bloody awful. Since your son left me I've spent every waking moment of my life pining for my best friend, aching for fulfillment that never comes, unable to commit a single worthwhile word to paper all the while fucking everything in Britain with testicles. And how are you?' But unsure of what she expected of me I resolved to answer with a straightforward but uninformative, "Fine." Then I remembered my manners and added, "How are you?"

"I'm personally fine, dear," she told me. Her voice had none of its usual warmth. She cleared her throat. "Is it late there? I'm so sorry if I've woken you; it's only 7:45 here."

"Oh, yeah." I fidgeted uncomfortably. There was something quite unpleasant about this phone call, and yet I was still too tired and unsettled to find it out on my own. "No, it's all right; I haven't heard from you in some time. How's—" I knew I had to ask, even though something was telling me I rather shouldn't. "How's Gary?"

I heard her sigh, deeply and wearily, to the extent that it was nearly a groan. "I'm afraid it's Gary I'm calling about. Oh, he just — he's dead."

"Excuse me?" I asked, sitting up straighter.

"It's Gary, Stan. Gary's dead. He's — he's passed away."

I didn't know what to say. Immediately I felt I couldn't breathe, but I somehow was managing still, so I rasped out a rather impolite, "Bloody fuck." Then: "Oh my god. When?"

"Oh." Her voice was still too calm for my liking, but suddenly I could discern that the trembling quality it possessed was that of a woman who had been bawling so hard and so long she had only stopped because she hadn't got anymore in her. The last time I had heard this voice, it had been Butters'. "It was this evening," she managed. "A couple of hours ago." Unpredictably, she added, "I'm so sorry, Stan. I'm so sorry we haven't kept in touch, that this is what I've called you for. I really — my condolences, really."

Why was she offering _me_ condolences? "No, I'm sorry, _you_ have _my_ condolences." I was clutching my chest. "I'm not, I don't—" I was apparently having trouble forming a complete sentence.

"I know he wanted to tell you he was sick, but his father, and his brothers, they thought it would be better if we didn't, you know, I — I know you meant a lot to him," she said quietly. "I don't know what's going to happen now, I don't know—"

"Well, there will be a funeral," I said stupidly.

"Well, but I mean more like — I don't want my son confined to utter darkness."

"Well, when is it?" I asked, not wanting to discuss Mormon tenets at the moment. "The funeral, I mean."

"The memorial service is next week."

"I want to come."

"Oh, Stan, I couldn't ask that of you."

"No," I affirmed. I had never even been to the States, let alone Colorado. "I want to be there. I want to come."

"I really think it's best if you don't." There was a moment of silence. I could not even hear her breathing. And then: "Sweetheart, I'm so sorry. You meant so much to him, Stan. He wouldn't want you to go through what he went through, so please let me know that you're all right. They told us to tell his, er…" She whispered, "_Partners_. They told us it was a gay-related immunodeficiency. Are you well?"

I didn't know what she was talking about. "I think I'm fine. I mean, I don't know what to say—"

"You were so good to him, honey, we know, we all know. He was always so fond of you, he — I think he thought you were there with him, at the end. I really thought that. Sometimes he called for you."

This touched me. "He did?"

"Mmhmmm." She took a great big sniff, thick mucus audible. "His brothers hated knowing it, but he loved you. I'm so sorry, and I mean _really_ sorry — the way it ended, just everything. He was my son, you know. I loved that special little guy. I never, ever wanted him to be unhappy. I was so sorry he had to struggle with his, well—"

"He loved you," I managed.

"I'll talk to his father about the service but—"

I interrupted her to say, "I'll look for a ticket tomorrow." And without a second thought I hung up the phone.

* * *

This is by no means the most popular -- or best -- thing I have ever written, but I love it. I can't give up on it. Thank you so much for reading, if you got to this point. Feedback is appreciated, of course.


	4. Chapter 4

To say I awoke in the morning would be a misstatement, as I'd spent whatever was left of the night drifting off into a shallow sleep and then waking suddenly to the realization that a man I'd once considered myself all but married to was dead. I was sad, but not heartbroken — discomforted. All writers — all Englishmen — understand grief. Death is in our genes, clinging virally to our tissues. Our greatest monuments, churches and castles, are paved with bones and if the centuries of tourists' shoes can erase the names from the markers, the memory of death cannot be vanquished from our minds. We might try to fight it, propping up a rigid caste system to encourage the fantasy that our social conventions can best biological functions, but we know we are wrong.

What's more, gay men are practically born grieving. All of our greatest treasures made their names by dying. Gary had simply joined that legacy, and if I mourned him now, I was merely lamenting that we could never have had what I wanted — a domestic life legally acknowledged by the state, blond-haired children, and the intermingling of financial assets. Gary was the only man who'd ever stirred this in me, the only man with whom I had ever been more interested in having babies than having sex. Which is not to say that I was not interested in having sex with him; I was, and I did — at great length, and frequently. Likewise, I do not mean that I have forever been disinclined to have a domestic life with any other man, particularly Kyle, merely that the love I felt for Kyle was ever-present, a rollicking tide of romance that I wished to crest over me, as it had overshadowed my life. The thought of Kyle's love was too important to be relegated to mimicry of the heterosexual world.

As it happens, my first novel had been about Kyle; my second, Token. Of course, neither of these things was literally about the man who'd brought the work out of me, but rather, crudely edited stand-ins, bits and pieces I hacked off from Kyle and Token respectively and remolded to fit the point of my tale. Each of these fictions was indulgence: For me, the indulgence in an imaginary relationship with a man I wanted more control over; for the audience, indulgence in shameless erotica. These novels were nothing if not pornography with a hefty dose of schlock (one of those words I'd picked up at the Broflovski dinner table when I was 19 years old) — much pining and wondrously vivid descriptions of men's (and boys') body parts, assessing male torsos like they were dogs at show, or pedigreed horses, if pedigreed horses were meant to be masturbated about.

Kyle became, in my text, not a voluptuous auburn-haired creature with a sharp tongue, but a tow-headed runt who was basically a woman save for his perfect, average, blond-vanilla penis and hairless pillow of a scrotum. He had Kyle's brain, to be sure, but as part of the surgical transformation I removed every trace of masculinity. He did not start arguments but carefully avoided them; he did not defy his family passively but rather, suffered under their fists.

This fictional Kyle I named Benjamin, and I became the narrator, tormented by an awaking into homosexual love. My protagonist was not a virgin (though Benjamin was), as he'd been sleeping for some time with his busty girlfriend — a pale blonde version of Wendy. Ridiculous, really, as the book devolved into unrealistic sex scenes that followed long periods of high drama and shrieking. The action was begun at school and ended at Benjamin's sunny country home, modeled more on Brideshead than not, although a trip or two out to Blenheim Palace got me thinking about good, specific details. In the end of the story, fictional-me came to terms with his homosexuality and professed love to fictional-Kyle. Fictional-me and fictional-Kyle lived happily ever after in a quaint Yorkshire cottage, where fictional-me painted, and fictional-Kyle kept house, his family's noble fortune keeping us happy with no children to support. (Being gay and all.) In the post-script, fictional-Kyle passed away from liver cancer. My editor kindly suggested I cut it, and I took his advice. The 405-page book contained 144 pages of pure gay smut, and sold reasonably well for that type of thing.

Spurred by this unexpected modest success, I completed a second novel about a quite different fictional-me, and fictional-Token. Fictional-Token was the son of a wealthy Indian industrialist who had been knighted; our fictional selves trolled around France on holiday fucking unguardedly in the back rooms of Paris nightclubs and the beaches of Marseilles. Loads and loads of sex, and I have reason to believe Token never even read it. Whereas I took a denialist route with the first book, framing the story around the self-acceptance trials of a young man that I never personally went through, the follow-up was all a plotless devolution into sex and flowing, sparkling champagne poured over ripe fruit in exotic, pricey France. Kyle and I had been to Marseilles in anticipation of my drafting this monstrosity; it is amazing what one can convince publishers to finance in the pursuit of bad literature. In any case, that one I was ashamed of. Would Token have recognized himself in the heavy-lidded young man fictional-me found himself romanced by? Doubtful. He would have been too distracted by my overuse of adverbs to care.

For a bit I'd coasted on the royalties — I was quite popular in America, by all accounts, which seemed from a distance to be a nation of hungry queers looking to devour something erotic and foreign. The fact that people over there liked my writing really didn't help my opinion of the place, although I did receive an offer to actually go to New York City and read the thing aloud at some bookstore. "I'll join you if you go," Kyle had offered, but by then I'd met Gary, and in private I felt that a small bit of America had come to me at long last. When I was with Gary I did not write anything of substance, and after Gary left I was too busy cottaging to care.

So I'd written two bad books — and I knew they were bad because Gary read them both aloud, one after another, on our quiet evenings in my flat. In his effusive, flyover tone my words sounded dead — dull. Yes, all the emotion was there, the pathos of wanting Kyle and needing Kyle and having to do without Kyle; fictional-Token was harder to bear. Often after reading an arousing scene Gary would set the book down on the floor and very gingerly take my cock into his mouth by first balancing it on his lower lip and then letting it slip back until I was all but dripping down his esophagus.

That was the problem with dating a gay virgin — he found my writing to be enlightening, a massive turn-on, much the same way that he found me to be a revelation. But I was only an introduction, an overture before the libretto began. There was no reason to dislike my books, because there was nothing to judge them against. I took him in out of the cold, quite literally, and gave him the thing Colorado lacked: nakedness in all its forms.

Say what you will about the mountains but I cannot think of them as blank or uncomplicated. There are layers there, generations of the life of this planet compressed into hardness. My father went to the Rockies to consult on some seismic activity when I was 5, and brought me back a chunk of striated rock no larger than my palm is now. "That's history there, Stanley," he said to me when I unwrapped my rock, tied with cord and brown craft paper. "Each of those bands is 100 millennia." At my parents' home in Oxford atop my wobbly adolescent bookcase that rock sits still in a fossilized room, waiting for me to go home again. I know why Gary wanted to be with me; I never knew why he couldn't stay.

And now it was irrelevant because he was dead.

XXX

On Saturday morning I panicked and called Butters at his flat. I knew he would be there, that no man had drawn him away from his television set and faithful, hulking bulldog. He cried "Good morning!" so cheerfully I pulled the phone away from my ear while the words reverberated. "Hello?" I heard his tinny voice ask as I drew the receiver back to me. "Who's this?"

"Miss B, good morning."

"Stanley! Oh, hello, good morning. Lovely day. Do you see how sunny it is? We're just back from Southwark Park" — _we_ being Butters and Desdemona, the bulldog — "and I was about to have a cup of tea and eat cakes. It's so unexpected to hear from you, really, because generally I consider you the type of fellow who's occupied on Saturday mornings."

"Thanks for the frankness," I said. I didn't consider this amusing. "Glad your morning's going well. I've a favor to ask you, actually."

"Oh, anything."

"Would you please convey to Kyle my apologies? I won't be able to make it this evening."

A sudden intake of air, and Butters made an audible little _huh_ noise. "But it's Saturday, you know. What are you going to do if not go out dancing?" Which was a ridiculous question, really, because it was quite rare that any of us actually danced.

"Most likely stay in and have a quiet night."

"Well, at least come to Kyle's and have a drink with us!"

"No, thank you. I'd prefer to be on my own this evening."

"Stanley." Butters sounded something only short of hysterical. "Is everything all right? I can't imagine—"

"I'm fine, Butters, and you will be too. Just please give Kyle my regrets and have a lovely time without me this evening. All right?"

"Do you have a date?" Butters asked.

"Excuse me?"

"Are you seeing someone? Just bring him along."

"I'm not seeing anyone, Butters, I just don't want to hang around a bunch of drunken queens in a dark space with loud music tonight. Surely you can understand." He most certainly could understand, that I was sure of, but of course I hadn't told him why. No matter.

I made myself a cup of tea. I set it on the trunk doubling as a coffee table, and without so much as pausing I grabbed the photograph of myself and Gary off of the wall. For about two hours I sat on the sofa and stared at it while my tea grew cold. I wasn't sure how to classify my feelings; I wasn't by any stretch of the imagination happy, and yet the last thing I felt like doing was crying. I hadn't really missed him since I'd last seen him; if anything, I felt like something of an anthropologist, studying my petrified feelings from afar, recollecting memories in the vein of archived ephemera. How does one mourn a person he's no longer in love with and hasn't seen for three years?

I decided to go swimming. For the longest time, so long I did not know how long it truly was, I splashed back and forth in the lap pool, kicking my way across chlorinated turquoise waters; by the time I trudged back to the showers the skin across my feet and hands was pinched into little faces, so angry I could barely feel the club floor underneath my toes. In the showers, I spent minutes lathering the lavender-scented shampoo into a fine froth in my hands, and before I'd rinsed my hair a short man with bony shoulders had appeared behind me and begun stroking my abdomen, snaking around my flanks and hips to the front.

"I was watching you swim laps," he said into my ear. "You look like you've had a good workout."

Grasping his hand, I lowered his reach, enticing him further with a growling, "I could use a second one," clutching both of our fingers around the weight of my testicles. He groped a bit and kissed my neck.

I spun to face him. His hair was a preternatural blond — not dirty like Kenny's, but yellowish and gold, darker than Miss B's had been in her heyday, but reminiscent of Monet's haystacks at noon. It was matted with wetness and droplets of water were forming at the ends of the tapered strands. That was his distinguishing feature — I could tell even in the shower that he had perfect hair, effortless and easy and wonderful. Some men, men like me, had well-enough hair that looked acceptable — I never fussed with my hair, and it never looked anything more than good. This man's dripping locks formed a frame around his face that made me want to put my palms on his cheeks and kiss him — which I did, standing under the cooling jets of the shower at my club. This sort of thing happened in the showers all the time, but at this moment there happened to be no one nearby.

"My place or yours?" he asked, lips still against mine, water streaming into my eyes so I couldn't see anything.

"Mine," I said, which was a symptom of all the things affecting my better senses at the time. Tricking can often be a draw, and going back to someone's flat puts you in dangerous territory — the unknown itself can be a massive threat. But it's downright stupid to show a man you've met in the showers (or a toilet or a park) where _you_ live. One never knows who wants to make it a habit.

Nevertheless, I'd given my answer, and we went to my flat without talking or so much as looking at each other. He followed and I led, and once in my bedroom we snogged for quite some time, the afternoon decaying into a purple evening in late summer. In London sometimes there are still Anglican church bells to be heard in the distance, calling worshippers to prayer or signaling the time. Perhaps it was fitting that my local church was in fact Roman Catholic, and on this day I heard the judgment of the bells noisily reprimanding me from nearby, only across the square, as I fingered some unknown man.

We spoke little, and things proceeded accordingly, up to the moment when I was about to don a rubber. He grasped my wrist, eyes entreating me to stop. I wondered if I should tell him what I wanted was emotional protection, a barrier between myself and really having to be _with_ someone, literally leaving traces of myself inside of him or, much worse, vice-versa.

"Oh, all right." I tossed the rubber into the sheets, intellectually exhausted. "You like it raw?"

He shook his head. "I don't like it at all, actually."

This was hardly what I needed to hear. An erection was insisting itself inside my trembling fist, but it scarcely felt like my own. It felt detached, unrecognizable.

He tilted my chin up, flashing me a bittersweet smile. "You all right? We don't have to do this if you don't want to."

Brushing his hand away, I laughed. "Oh, I thought you didn't want to."

"Oh, I want to." He laughed to himself, steely and collected. "Sorry, I should have been clearer. I just prefer we don't go all the way. I reserve that privilege for my better half, if anyone."

I nodded, because I understood. We resumed kissing.

XXX

"This was refreshing and odd," he said as we sat down at a pub. I was drinking whisky again, not because I was thirsty but for the statement I hoped it would make to my latest companion. He and I paid separately for our drinks (perhaps to underscore the decided absence of romance) and took a table in the back, underneath a shadowy, Victorian overhang of iron curled in fleur-de-lis. The walls were scalloped burgundy textile, discolored with tobacco staining where it met the wainscoting, sheathed in recent panes of glass. The preservation of history — it was an inclination I was sympathetic to, and yet at the moment all I wanted was to shut my eyes and curl up into a ball.

Witnessing no response from me, he continued: "I don't usually do that kind of thing. Step out, I mean. I suppose I just saw you alone, and couldn't help myself."

It was a rare occasion that I deigned to share a post-coital beverage with anyone whose name I didn't know, but given the circumstances, I'd gone along. It occurred to me while we were shuffling through the streets, rough-skinned youths pushing past us on their way to the Old Street Tube, that I should ask why he was so eager to recommend a pub in my area. I'd never been to the Bunch of Thistles, but it seemed a decent enough place — mixed company, but just fine.

"Flattering," I said over my glass. "I don't suppose I'm the first one you've used that line on."

He sighed, frowning. "I never lie," he said. "Honesty is the most important quality. Emotional honesty, factual honesty, the spirit of honesty — I demand it from everyone. And you should demand it, too — from your lovers, your friends, your teachers, your government. Honesty is the cornerstone of society. And censorship is the suppression of honesty."

There was a tone to his voice that told me he'd practiced these words — as if they were lifted from a play or a movie.

"So, how would your 'better half' take it if he knew we'd just…" I rolled my eyes. No need to finish the thought.

My date shook his head. "He'd probably ask me if I enjoyed it, or if you might like to join us some evening."

"No, thank you." I'd never been one for threesomes. Sometimes they tended to happen, in the back of a bookstore or some really filthy cottage. The backrooms at Camp were notorious for this — it was even more prevalent 10 years ago, when the idea of erotic excess was fresh and gay sex was finally legal, at least in name. Then it had been novel to grasp for everything one's little hands could hold, literally and figuratively. The very pursuit of shoving as much or as many into every last orifice became religious itself. By the mid-1970s, I was living with Gary, or he was living with me, and the idea of fucking multiple men at once began to seem disingenuous. The joy of sex had always been, at least for me, in making a connection with one lover, reveling in him — and moving on. But in that moment, there is only him.

My trick was looking at me with those earnest eyes, perfect coif taunting me with its embodiment of some kind of solid domestic relationship. "Tell your boyfriend three-way fucking's not for me," I repeated. "Then I might have to do something rash like learn your name."

"It's Gregory." His voice was so warm I wanted to hit him. Instead I drank whisky. "I say, is it a habit of yours to make it with strangers on a regular basis without learning their names? I enjoyed it, mind you, so it's nothing to me if you don't, but it's simply safer to find out these sorts of things. If nothing else it's how you might make new friends. And it's potentially deadly to fuck strangers whose names you can't be bothered to learn, _Stanley_. Or is it Stan? Whichever you prefer. I'm not picky, and I do hate to be rude."

Of course, he now had my attention. "Who _are_ you?" I gasped. "And why do you know my name?"

"Your name, dear? I know it because I read it off of the Oxford diploma on the wall, and the paycheck you left on the nightstand, from the Telegraph. Then, of course, I remembered reading your byline on piece of that gossipy nuisance about the Tetley heir, which led me to recall a novel you published about some kind of erotic odyssey through France. I didn't read it, but my friend Chris did. Then again, he _is_ Gallic, and practically breathes sex. Are you all right? You're looking at me like I'm a stalker."

I nodded, and shook it off: "It doesn't seem too horridly ridiculous to come to that conclusion!" I snapped.

"Well, I'm not stalking you, I'm afraid. I've seen you around, milling around Hoxton Square and that coffee shop on Old Street. But I only made the connection when I saw you in the showers."

"You're not reassuring me in the least!"

"Calm down. I assure you, I'm an upstanding fellow. I'm a politician, which is how I'm good with names and to a lesser extent, faces. In fact, I am your MP. Maybe you've voted for me? Gregory—"

"Stop!" Before he could even get out his last time, I had cut him off. "Your friend," I demanded. "Your 'better half.' What's his name?"

"It's Chris," he said. "Short for Christophe. You seem nervous, dear." His fingers were laced atop the table so serenely that it took all my strength not to throw the end of my drink in his face. "Don't be nervous. I believe we've just had a misunderstanding. We're all friends here, Stanley. Or do you prefer Stan?"

"I prefer _neither_," I hissed, getting up. I threw a couple of coins down on the table for the barmaid. "This never happened."

He cocked an eyebrow at me. "I think you're being rash."

"Rash? You're practically a socialist and you're calling _me_ rash?"

"So you have heard of me," he said, in a weary tone that implied this happened to him all the time.

"I've only heard that you're single-handedly dismantling the British Empire."

"I meant to leave politics out of it," he said. "Come on, we had a lovely time tonight. Don't let's argue about _that_."

"I don't vote," I announced. "Have a lovely evening."

As I hurried away from the pub, I felt slightly ill. The nearer I got to my flat, the more I had managed to talk myself into the idea of taking an extended vacation. By the time I'd barricaded myself inside and collapsed on the sofa, my mind was made up; I would go to Gary's funeral. And certainly, I would put this unlikely incident out of mind.

XXX

I visited a travel agent, a shrewish girl with big earrings hanging pendulously from her lobes, ovals of canary against the auburn frizz of her coif. I'd known her for a few years now, but hadn't been in for some time, having traveled no place since Kyle and I returned from Thailand. We talked about vapid things for a while; her boyfriend was a hardscrabble mechanic in Tower Hamlets. I didn't care about the other girl she'd found him with, or the bloody roses he'd given her in apology, but in polite society it's unacceptable to come off as uncaring. After about 10 minutes of this I told her I needed to get to Colorado in two days' time.

"A friend has passed," I said, unsure of what the details would do to the cost of fare. "I've decided it's imperative that I see him off."

She looked at her chipped nails and looked back at me, citing a price I found ludicrous.

"No, you don't understand. I have to fly to Denver two days from now, for a funeral. Can't anything be done about the price?"

"Two days is short notice," she repeated.

"But my friend has _died_ and all I want is to attend his _funeral_, not go prancing around the Western hemisphere on holiday."

"Family member?"

"Ex-lover," I clarified.

"Condolences," she said. Somehow she'd transformed from vapid to downright steely. "Wish I could help, mister, but travel costs what it costs, you know."

I knew.

Unsure of how else to get my hands on the funds, I rang my father, the geology professor who considered me the failure of his loins. To make a case to him I first had to speak with my mother, the gatekeeper, who could not get her clutches on me without further wasting my time with trivialities.

"Your sister's youngest has got an ear infection," she reported. "But it's okay, because she's got him a prescription for antibiotics. Can you imagine a life without antibiotics? It was like that while I was growing up, you know. Now the doctors, anything that goes wrong they just hand out antibiotics. I had German measles when I was quite young, and no one ever prescribed me any sort of medications."

"Well, that's because German measles is a virus."

"I don't see what the difference is," she replied. "You can cure anything lately, just anything. And doctors just prescribe antibiotics no matter what it is. You can barely take a breath without someone diagnosing you with a virus and giving you antibiotics or a jab for whatever it is. Frankly I think medicine is an overextended field. Lord knows I prefer private surgery to the National Health."

"Listen, there are no cures for viruses," I snapped. "You can prevent them but they certainly can't be cured with antibiotics. People with no money have got to use the National Health, and be damned happy they can get anything instead of struggling through the overfed American plutocracy. Now for the love of god put my father on the phone or I'll cry."

If anything has consistently been effective on my mother since my boyhood, it was the threat of crying.

"I need an advance so I can afford a trip to Colorado," I informed my father. We were not in the habit of saying hello.

"An excellent place, to be sure. You know, I went there once."

"Right. But I'm not taking a holiday."

"Well, I have to assume, knowing you, that it couldn't be _business_."

In any other situation I would work with the man, concentrate on lulling him into my point of view. But I felt the immediacy of the situation pressing at me, and decided to plunge into the crux of the issue: "I've a funeral over there, and I can't afford a plane ticket. Would you please lend me the money?"

"Sorry for your loss."

"Thanks."

"Who died?"

"Gary. Gary Harrison."

"Never heard of him."

"Yes, you have." It was torture keeping myself from gritting my teeth. "He was my boyfriend."

"The ginger?"

"No, that's _Kyle_. He lives in Notting Hill Gate. I know you know who he is. I'm not talking about Kyle. I'm talking about Gary. Pardon my shortness, but this really isn't a joking matter. Gary and I were together for three years; I brought him home on several occasions. He had blond hair and I loved him."

"_Ohhhh_. Ah, you mean the little missionary."

"Please don't make me beg."

"All right, I'll spare you the begging: no."

"But I only need—"

"You don't need anything, Stanley, you just want. Want want want want want. You want me to give you more of my hard-earned money. Haven't you heard of the concept of 'work ethic'? If you want money you'll have to earn it."

"This is not some frivolous triviality I'm playing at!" I cried. "Someone I loved is dead and I want to go to his funeral!"

"Love someone who can give me grandchildren," my father replied. "Then we can talk."

Deciding the conversation was over, I slammed down the receiver.

XXX

I sought no further for a ticket to Denver. I had a check on the nightstand, it was true, but I needed that for household expenses, or at least to eat. In any case, I spent Saturday night drinking and all of Sunday morning drinking, steadily, as soon as the sun woke me up. I barely felt anything, neither drunkenness nor sadness, but I did have a vague sense of injustice, as if there were something or someone I should be fighting harder. The truth was, by noon on Sunday I wasn't sure why I wanted to go to Gary's funeral, and the immediacy of the crisis had slowed; instead of moping, I decided to swim.

Laps back and forth across the pool did not tire me so much as get me thinking about the tall, dark man in a well-cut pair of little trunks I had seen swanning out to the weight room about the same time I'd been heading for a swim. I found him in the sauna, sweating comfortably on a white, thick towel, and joined him in there, resting a hand on his chest as he breathed. Neither of us spoke. He led me to a bathhouse I'd never visited before, down in the City, not far from Eric's condo. For a moment as my trick negotiated with the man at the front desk, I wondered if I should not be frightened of whom I might come across in the twisty little streets of the oldest part of London. Instinctively, however, I was soon angling myself into a new, hairless sphincter.

Only at the end did we exchange words: "You were fine," he said, distracted, observing his own nails as he lay on his back in the tiny, red-lit room. His voice was thick with a Slavic accent, which reminded me of the Cold War, and Gerald Broflovski's dire-sounding seminars around the dinner table on the nature of the fascist soul. "I've had better," my lover said, twisting the knife.

"You certainly didn't live up to the way you filled out your trunks," I spat back. He threw a pot of petroleum at me, and I was grateful to leave.

XXX

I was convinced that Kyle had run away to elope with Clyde in Shropshire, and meeting him for drinks was probably pointless. Still, I got ready to go, lacing my trainers and sniffing my denim trousers to make sure they didn't smell like anything that might prove offensive to Kyle, or the future Mrs. Clyde Donovan, whoever decided to show up to the Bucky to meet me.

"You look so awful!" Kyle exclaimed when he saw me. He was late, but I only knew that because I had heard a couple of tourists announce the time when they mistakenly wandered in a few minutes before Kyle. "Stanley, sweetheart, have you brushed your hair lately?" he stuck a hand in my rat's nest, and attempted to groom out some kind of shape. "My dear, you're being awfully quiet and your hair looks like something I might have a nightmare about. Are you okay?"

"I don't know," I said. Two empty whisky tumblers sat in front of me. I'd even chewed up the leftover ice. "How's old Clyde?"

"Old Clyde hasn't been around lately," Kyle said darkly. Then, his tone became lighter, and he joyfully declared, "His mother fell down the stairs or something. I haven't seen him since the night after the opera. Actually, we had a tremendous fight. His mother _called my flat_, which appalled me, because lord _knows_, I hadn't given him permission to give anyone my number. And I wouldn't, just for the record, Stanley — I'd never do that. I don't _like_ him. He's just awful, of course, and after we fuck — I cannot even call it making love, as he's got absolutely no passion for anything — I just _beg_ him to hold me — to anything, actually. I just want him to touch my skin, to tell me he enjoyed it, to look me in the eyes, to—"

I grimaced. "But, back to the story."

"But back to the story," he agreed. I glanced down at my crotch, wondering if it was the anti-erotic vibe of death and departure or the lost yearnings of Kyle's love life that were stifling my erection tonight. "We had just finished, and I was on top of him, in his face, trying to get him to stay awake and talk to me. I know, why would a reasonable person ever _want_ to talk with Clyde? It would just make me feel so much less of a depraved whore. I want him to talk to me so _badly_. Half the time he doesn't even say anything, and the other half of the time, it's all, 'Oh, Craig's been talking about developing an art gallery, and he'd like me to help foot the bill, so if I do, what do you think I should have myself listed as on the statements?' I just don't _care_, you know, and it's driving me _nuts—_"

"The story, _Kyle_," I gritted out. "Tell me the story, please."

"You're getting very snippy, dear. Something's the matter. What's the matter?"

I sighed. "Please tell me the end of your story."

"Oh." He coughed. "Um, the end. Well, he was drifting off asleep and I was attempting to get him not to. And the phone rings, and it's his mother. Apparently she slipped, and took a tumble at the bottom of the staircase. It was only a couple of stairs, and he said she said she was entirely _fine_, but she was sufficiently startled to motivate him to run home. I said it was appalling that he'd wake up and hop out of bed and run off to his _mother_, but when I'm naked next to him with his seed dripping down my thighs, he just rolls over and falls asleep. Am I insane, or is there a problem with that?"

"Oh, you're not insane."

"Thanks! I appreciate that. In any case, I became very angry and picked up a loafer from the floor and threw it at his face. Made a nice long gash, too. … And it will definitely scar! I hope his mother asks him how he cut himself and he has to dance around the issue of enraging some male lover who launched a shoe at him."

"Yeah, that's a good story."

"And as he left I realized I'd best take your advice and stop sleeping with people for a while." A grin of unparalleled satisfaction bled across his face. "Are you proud of me?"

I nodded. "Yes, very good." I wanted to get up and hug him, but I was certain there was no point.

And Kyle was still talking: "The only problem is, I keep having sex dreams about him! Isn't that ludicrous? It's that godforsaken cock of his, it keeps haunting my slumber. Last night I dreamt that it was completely detached from him — almost as if it were a dildo, you know, but consecutively it was still Clyde's cock. It's odd how that happens in dreams, but it must happen to you, too, at times. In any case, that fat old thing, in my dream I was practically impaled on it, and when I awoke I had the hardest erection in forever. But I wasn't sure if celibacy means I have to abstain from masturbation, too. Luckily it went down after I went to the loo. Do you think next time I should just indulge myself?"

"I don't know, darling." I frowned. I wished I had another whisky, but Kyle would be offended if I got up in the middle of his rant. "Do whatever."

"Do you ever dream of cocks?" he asked. "It is the strangest genre, isn't it? I wish I had a psychoanalyst at times simply to see the scandalized look on his face when I told him these things."

I sniffed. "You assume your therapist would be male."

He grinned. "Stanley, are you accusing me of subtle male chauvinism?"

"Kyle, my darling, I am outright calling you a misogynist."

He laughed, and it delighted me. He threw his head back, chest heaving, hands clasped. "You're right! I am!" I knew he found it funny because it was true. He wiped his eyes, still chuckling. "And now I suppose I'm an abstinent misogynist."

"I guess so."

He shrugged. "So be it. What were you drinking? Oh, how stupid of me to ask. I am going to get myself a cider." He picked up one of my empty glasses. "Want another?"

"If you don't mind," I said.

Returning with a pint of cider and a third whisky for me, Kyle's expression had dimmed considerably. "I don't get you tonight," he said, sitting down, before pausing to take a first sip of his drink. I tried to remain stony-faced as he wiped his lips. "Something is obviously off. I know you like to play like you know everything about me and _you're_ a great riddle, but I assure you, I can tell when you're miserable just by looking at you."

It took a moment for me to assess the veracity of his claim. In one way, each moment we'd spent together, hours upon hours of them since our youths, bled together into one great chorus of misery. Did he have any idea?

"If nothing else, you must owe me some excuse for refusing to come to my flat to have a drink on Saturday. And to call Butters instead of telling me yourself! You are either doing a poor job of hiding something, or incensed at me. But I don't think you would have shown up today if you were, would you? … Mmm, no. Now that I think about it, you _would_, simply to make a point. Stanley, I am _trying_. You haven't even brushed your _hair_—"

"I never brush my hair," I broke in to say. "I'm not you. I don't care what my hair looks like."

"Well, you usually at least try to arrange it with your hands so it has some semblance of order. But you're right, you're very butch, which is why it bothers me that you're being evasive. Just tell me. Is it money? I put these on your tab" — he pointed to the drinks on the table; mine was almost half gone — "but I can pay it off. I can't feel good about feeling miserable if you're _actually_ unhappy. It doesn't work for me that way!"

I took first a deep breath, and then I finished my drink in one fluid gulp, for courage. Kyle was looking at me, hands slack on the table, pint virtually untouched. The arch of his mouth was slouching in genuine concern, his eyes open wide and concerned. Kyle might fake smoking to impress a suitor — as he had Christophe at the beginning of the summer, which was only a few months prior and felt years past — or interest in some bloke's stamp collection, or force himself to recite basic sentiments in German. But he was no good about outright feigning concern.

"Gary has passed away," I said, slowly, as if I were speaking to a child, not a 36-year-old man.

"My goodness!" Kyle's face has scrunched up with the unpredictable awkwardness of someone who does not know how he should feel, but is still surprised, and probably a bit unnerved to find that he doesn't quite care. "I'm so sorry." From across the table, he took my hand. "When and how?"

"This week." I sighed, despite myself. Part of me did feel a bit better. "His mother called me. He was ill, I don't know with what exactly because I didn't want to upset her with questions. I was just caught off guard, you know and — well, I suppose I was grateful she had called."

"I didn't realize you were still on speaking terms! Are you going to the funeral? When is it?"

Ignoring the matter of the funeral I said, "We were not on speaking terms. She had my telephone number, obviously. I had Gary's but I never _used_ it."

"Oh, _Stanley_." Kyle abandoned his seat to join me at the banquette. He put his arms around me, burrowing his cheek into my neck, giving me the barest hint of a kiss by brushing his lips against my cheek. "I'm so sorry," he whispered.

"I know." I managed to return the gesture, locking my hands into his sides. "Don't be."

"My god, I am, though! How do you feel?"

"Sad, I suppose." I shrugged into our embrace. "But not very sad. He was already a ghost in so many ways."

"You don't know what killed him," Kyle repeated.

"She said an 'immunodeficiency,' that was her word. But I don't care what he died from. It's unfortunate enough to know he's gone."

"Maybe my brother would know." Kyle sat up, straightening his posture away from my body, the sad little cluster of dejection we had morphed into. He brightened. "I don't want to let you alone. You need someone to care for you. When will you decide about the funeral?"

I pinched my nose. "I don't know. I don't think I shall go."

"Oh, but he was _important_ to you—"

If Kyle had been this interested in or concerned about Gary when Gary had been not only alive, but living with me, perhaps Kyle would have been in the position to get a call from Gary's mother himself, so he could have interrogated her personally.

"Kyle, I don't know. Darling, please don't make me deal with it."

"But you have to! Death is not a fleeting thing. It's terrifying!"

"No, it is exactly a fleeting thing. It's we who make it into something terrifying."

He crawled back onto me, reattaching to my flank and curling his hand into my shirt. "I'm quite free this week, except lunch on Wednesday is with the bitches from Oxo. One of them propositioned me in the loo last week, did I mention?"

I shook my head.

"Well, one of them did. And he looked okay, honestly, but even a week ago I kept thinking I had better salvage things with Clyde, and you know I detest that sort of thing because it makes me feel like a trollop. Maybe I would have taken him up _this_ week, but this celibacy idea is too alluring at the moment. And, well — he's married, of course. And that simply won't do for me."

"Maybe you should give him my number. I'm still trying to be sexually active."

In my arms, I felt him tense. "No, that's all right," he said icily. "But I do have an idea. Would you like to come to dinner on Friday? Assuming you're not at a funeral."

"Love to," I said.

"Oh, good. I'll see you before then, _of course_. But just for reference, sun down is about 8:30, I don't know specifically — so expect I suppose to arrive about 8 or so, with or without me."

"Oh, no." I groaned. "Kyle, really."

"What? It's been a long time since you've seen my parents. I mean, rather than in stealth at the opera. And I haven't been to dinner in weeks and my mother is close to slaughtering me. And Ike will be there!"

"Oh, he'll be in town?" I asked, managing to restrain myself from slapping him for tricking me.

"Yeah, he will, but — but I'm mostly concerned about you. I don't want you to be alone this week, Stanley. You need to be around people."

Somehow I felt this was the last thing I needed.

XXX

Kenny and I had been meeting at the Old Street coffee shop before our liaisons. At first I was deeply suspicious of his motivations, and suspected that Eric was somehow the invisible hand pulling the strings in this tryst. This was undoubtedly Kyle's influence — he had made it his hobby to doubt Eric's motivations, scorn his actions. I suppose the cynical answer to the question no one had asked — because no one knew — as to why I kept showing up to meet Kenny was that I wanted to sleep with him.

But I didn't — not this week, at least. I woke up in the morning hardly aware of what day it was. I hadn't bought a newspaper in days, had turned in my review of _Death in Venice_ at some point — it was short enough, 400 words, half of which was a summary. Perhaps I would be paid soon. It didn't matter. I found some stale digestives and a hard-boiled egg in the pantry and ate them slowly, standing by the windows, looking out onto Hoxton Square. Below me, squirrels chased across the grass, savoring the end of the summer.

It was raining, and I could not muster the enthusiasm to rally for an afternoon of illicit sex. I considered not meeting Kenny at all, and did try to talk myself out of it. What had I to lose by failing to show? Certainly for all his blustering about being in a position of power, Kenny had no recourse if I decided to stand him up. I was free to be with whomever I wanted whenever it pleased me; he had only the eight hours of Eric's workday to run around charging men for sex.

But meet him I did, albeit belatedly, habit proving a comfort. "You're tardy," he said playfully, swatting me on the shoulder when I found him sitting in an armchair in the back of the shop. "Tick-tock, Stanley."

"Yeah, well." I shrugged.

"Buy me a coffee?"

"I suppose."

I bought myself a latte and Kenneth a black coffee, thin and hot. He liked it with sugar but not milk, and he made me watch him crumble seven stale sugar cubes into his drink.

"That'll rot your teeth," I warned.

"I don't care anymore! I've got someone to pay for my dentist now. Maybe Eric might get them fixed."

"How do you mean?"

He shrugged and took his first sip of coffee.

"Have you considered going to university?"

Kenny set his cup down. "I'd have to finish school first, wouldn't I?"

"How much education have you had?"

His brow wrinkled. "I left when I was 14," he confessed. "I would have left earlier, but my mother thought I should stay. I don't know why. When I turned 14 I one day realized, I'm not book smart. That, and I got caught being 'inappropriate' — so they said — behind the wrestling mats with a girl two years up from me. So I left then. Yeah, I was 14."

"That was a long time ago, I reckon."

"Oh, no, it wasn't so long. It was only—" He halted himself, before continuing, "Only like 10 years ago or thereabouts."

"I'm much older than you and 10 years feels like ages ago to me."

"What does age have to do with it?"

"I've lived longer, so time moves faster for me."

"Oh."

I finished my latte before he finished his coffee, and scanned the crowd in the shop. There was the usual complement of lunch-break suits, popping in to cottage; there was also a steady contingent of younger artists, all of whom had sullen, lost looks on their faces. They sat together but did not speak, nursing a single mug of watered-down espresso for hours, scribbling in notebooks while they sat spread-legged, both the boys and the girls. Their hair was uniformly ratty and they mostly wore gray. One boy with hennaed hair in spikes wore purple boots with pointed toes and thick black platforms.

Kenny caught me staring at the cluster of youths. "You're checking out the redhead," he said, snapping his fingers in my face. "You know, I might be here for the money, but it _is_ possible to hurt my feelings."

"Oh, yeah, right," I hissed. "And how do you think Eric feels? Paying you for companionship, _supporting_ you, and you're here to make it with _me_."

"Well, Eric doesn't know. I don't make eyes at people right in front of him."

I sat back, sighing. "It's irrelevant, actually. It's been lovely, but look at the time." I shook my fist to indicate to him that I meant to be getting on with my day, whatever that might consist of. "Cheers, Ken. Thanks for meeting me."

Predictably, he followed me out of the store and out onto the street, where he tugged at the back of my shirt to halt me. "Wait just a minute!"

"What?" I stopped, throwing my hands up, whipping around to face him.

"Aren't we, um." He was feeling around in the back pocket of his trousers for a cigarette. Maybe he wasn't used to rejection? "You can't just walk away from me, you know."

"I can't?"

"Well, no."

Another pair of dark-clothed wraiths walked by us — this a pair, the girl round and stout with layers of white chalk on her cheeks, the scarlet grease on her lips carefully applied. The boy was tall, too tall, with a fat nose that reminded me something of Kyle's before it was broken. The girl's fishnet shirt caught on the lintel as her companion held the door open for her, and she brushed past without noticing, or at least without stopping. Duly, the netting burst as she disappeared into the store. Kenny eyed them with suspicion, and I stood with my arms crossed.

When the door was again shut, Kenny said, "I wouldn't have come if I'd known you weren't going to follow through."

"Wouldn't you?" I asked.

His cheeks turned pink. "I am trying to make a living!"

"Your living is Eric's concern, not mine. If you'd prefer to follow me back to my flat, feel free. I'm going to try to write something, but you're welcome to keep me company." Even as I said this I was picturing him stomping away; I would duck back into the shop and chat up the red-haired artist with the purple shoes.

Kenny looked pained, wrinkling his nose while he contemplated his options. While he did this, I crossed my arms and tried to convey impatience.

"Okay," he said, finally. "Let's go back to yours, then."

He wasn't over for long, but long enough for me to make both of us a cup of tea. We sat on the sofa, the steam wafting off of his beverage wilting the tips of his fringe, so that they matted against his forehead ever so slightly.

"I'm not often rejected," he said after a few tentative sips. "And I don't usually drink tea at all, really."

"I suggest you begin if you want to seem a natural Englishman." I smiled, to try to bolster his mood, but the look of dismay on his face could not be banished. "Oh, really, it hasn't anything to do with you. This has been an odd week for me, to say the least."

"Oh, has it?" Kenny fidgeted uncomfortably on my sofa, kicking the trunk that I used for a coffee table rhythmically. I'm sure he wasn't aware he was doing it. "Are you going to elaborate?"

"You know, I don't _really_ owe you an explanation."

"Yes, you do!" he spat. "Because I came all the way to meet you, and I'll be damned if I leave your flat without getting what I want!"

"Well, what do you want?" I asked. "Money? I can give you 60 quid, if you want it." A lie. I really couldn't. At least, I shouldn't. Paying him for sex, that was one thing. Paying him to boost his self-esteem, that was simply idiotic.

He shook his head. "That's not what I want."

"Oh." Suddenly, he looked less haughty to me, and more vulnerable. The ratty hems of his trousers brushed against my furniture, clashing with my lacquer princess phone. It seemed he was actually here to have sex with me — an idea I'd not considered. Suddenly I felt sorry for him, but as I didn't want to sleep with him, I felt the best I could do was explain.

Predictably, he wasn't sure what to say. "Sorry, I guess," he mumbled, throwing the hood of his thin sweatshirt over his damp hair. "Next time just say so."

"Well, let us hope there is not a next time." At the door, I kissed him goodbye on the cheek. "Whoring is not quite the romantic calling you envisioned, is it? Have you found some greater truth to life yet?"

He looked at me as if I were mad, rubbing the spot on his cheek where my lips had been. After a moment he said, slowly, "I think people are the great truth to life, and death hurts less if we are together."

"That is very poetic," I said. "But alas, you are someone's, and I am grieving. Go home to Eric. Make him feel as if he's getting something for his money."

"You are going to go back to the coffee shop and fuck that stupid ghost boy with the hideous hair and shoes," he replied.

I didn't deny a thing, just kissed him on the other cheek as he departed — because, of course, he was correct. A half hour later I was back in that shop, stealthily waiting to corner that pale specimen when he was away from his friends, trying to draw him to my corner with long glances and careful fingers at my lips.

If Token was something exotic out of Conrad, this miserable boy with deep cheekbones was Percy Bysshe Shelley, or maybe the opening chapter of _Wuthering Heights_, in which the tone is gothic and staid, like the stale air of a sealed crypt. The henna in his hair was so like Kyle's at university, except not wild and curly, but manipulated to perfection. The color, though — the color was just perfect. Shades of red on top of shades of red, but this boy had laced black in, too. I stared him down until we locked gazes, and then he could barely focus on whatever he was scribbling in his notebook.

At last he approached me on my overstuffed throne in the corner of the shop, scowling — my trench coat unbelted, hair mussed, and dick throbbing.

"You're staring at me," he said, speaking in the most joyless, effected little tone. "You left with that boy and came back to stare at me."

"Guilty," I admitted. I decided to test the waters a bit: "But you're so carefully cultivated, I should think you want girls to stare at you."

In a jerky motion, he dug into the pocket of his (incredibly tight) trousers for a cigarette. "Why would I want girls to stare at me?" he asked. "I find traditional ideas about fairytale love make me nauseated. And besides, going with girls is so conformist. Are you a fucking conformist?" As he lit his cigarette he glared down at me, dangling that little code word for me to reach toward.

"Of course not," I said, satisfied with myself. In my mind he was a boy, but I was thinking it lightly — he looked very mid-twenties, and I could see underneath the very thin, powdery layer of foundation he wore that his cheeks were pitted with acne scars.

"I don't know that we have anything in common, though." He exhaled with such grace that in his fingers, the cigarette seemed to fuse with his anatomy. "I cannot embrace the lies that the fucking government wants the citizens of Britain to eat from their fucking trough. If you want some kind of fairytale thing I suggest you look elsewhere. Life is pain, and that is why I write."

"I write because life is long and I need something to fill it with. You see, I recently found out that my ex died, and I don't think I can make it to the funeral. So certainly I understand pain, and I think we have a great deal in common. Do you think you need some kind of filling, as well? Because I think I can assist you in that regard."

The cigarette was shedding ashes right onto the cement floor of the coffee shop. He fidgeted from side to side, not knowing how to stand still. "I think I might appreciate that, yeah." He hunched down to speak at my level. "I have to finish up here. Meet me at the center of the roundabout in half an hour."

He went back to his friends, and I slipped out quietly. The sex, I'm afraid, was mediocre, and he cried afterward, choking out something cliché about never having been with a man before. When I offered to take him to the Duke of Buckingham for a drink, he snapped at me, "Like I want to go drinking after I let you fuck me like some kind of conformist!" It seemed he was a very confused fellow, and I left dispirited, only to return home and drink a bottle of sherry and fall asleep on the sofa. It was only 10 p.m. I was awakened at 7 the next morning when I heard the church bells ringing across the square, the empty bottle sticking into my side.

XXX

The Broflovskis lived in Islington, a green nugget of suburbia north of the City and northwest of where I lived. Sandwiched in between was middle-class residential London, the parts of the city where people really only wanted to live their lives, unconcerned with things like titles and peerages and Oxford diplomas or the striations of rock faces. At least, this was how I conceptualized things. The house was situated on a row just as regal as the gated garden square Token and Wendy lived on, but without the garden. I was 19 when I first visited this stately home, purchased by Gerald Broflovski as a sort of dowry for his new wife when London was still two years shy of being ravaged by the Blitz. I think before the Second World War, Islington was not a particularly well-kept area, but it was an area with fat, white houses guarded by iron-picket fences and strapping lawns, decrepit though these manses were.

The Broflovskis were affluent in a quiet way; Sheila kept the lawns immaculate whilst navigating the lower house with a kind of practiced ease. Surely it was remarkable, and she frightened me.

Hence I almost screamed when she found me sitting on the pavement in front of her house on Friday night, waiting to meet her son.

"Stanley," she said, trying to hoist me by the collar of my shirt. "What are you doing sitting out here alone?"

I stood up and brushed the fronts of my trousers, cheeks pink. "Waiting for Kyle, of course," I answered.

Sheila looked at me as if I were insane. "Well, why didn't you just ring the bell?"

"Um." I wasn't really sure what I was supposed to say. The thought of spending time alone with Kyle's family was wrenching, and yet the mess I was in now seemed worse.

Her head was crowned by a wig in an acid, false-red color, towering higher than any sort of hairdo should reach — I didn't care at all about hair, and even I was cognizant of this. The pile of fake hair trembled as she laughed, and groped me in a maternal hug. "Stanley, you're too silly! You don't need to be coquettish with me. It's been so long! How are you?" Her accent was high and nasal, totally foreign, except for the inflections I recognized from Kyle — the way they both dragged vowels into unwilling diphthongs.

She let go of me, and I tried to figure out how I _was_, actually. "I'm … fine. How are you?"

"Eh." She articulated a shrug, as if to emphasis the syllable. "Work keeps me busy. Especially the networking! It's so blah. People wanting to make me go to the opera or whatever." Her thick lips curved into a smirk. "How did you enjoy _Death in Venice_, anyway?"

"It — it, uh, I guess I didn't really love—"

"Oh, I think I know what you mean. We can talk about it forever if you want. But, come inside before my soup burns. I know, soup in the summer, it's _crazy_." She began to waddle back into the house, but turned to crook a finger at me. "Come on, Stan. Don't be shy, you're practically family. Come along, and do me a favor." She crept back up to me, looking around conspiratorially. "Don't mention to Kyle I know you boys were there. It's easier to guilt him when he thinks he got away with it."

Thanks to some kind of benevolence, I only waited another five minutes for Kyle. He apologized for his lateness with big arm gestures and by covering his mouth with his hands.

"I'm not bothered by it," I whispered in the parlor.

"It's not you I care about," he hissed. "My mother—" He arched his eyebrows. "I'm sure she'd prefer I'm on time."

"I don't think she actually _minds_."

"No, you don't understand how penance works."

"Strange, because between the two of us, I'm the one that's Catholic."

"That's not funny!" Kyle snapped. He was holding a bottle of white wine he'd brought for his parents, and he pointed it at me accusatorily. "I had a long day at work, so don't you make this harder for me!"

"Okay."

"My taxi driver asked me if I was meeting my girlfriend for dinner."

"Okay."

"I really hate getting asked things like that."

"Well, what did you say?"

"I told him the truth; I said I was going to my _parents_' for dinner. But isn't that odd? No one ever thinks I have a girlfriend." Looking at Kyle, with his sharp, tailored herringbone waistcoat and plucked eyebrows, it was difficult to see how anyone might _make_ that mistake. "Oh, don't even think that!"

"Think what?" I asked.

"You could pass if you _wanted_. If you cared, I mean, you could. People don't usually confuse me, I think."

"I think you're paranoid. No one is even thinking about it, unless they're of the passing persuasion themselves."

"Possible," Kyle agreed, nodding. "_Possible_." I was certain he wasn't listening.

Ike arrived shortly thereafter, accompanied by his father — who did not drive, and had gone with a chauffeur to fetch Ike from Euston. Whereas I truly had never bothered to learn to operate a vehicle, Gerald Broflovski certainly _could_; he simply found it beneath himself. I imagined for someone like Ike, this was very awkward — being met at a busy rail station on a Friday night by a man with a big gray beard wearing a cardigan, and his driver.

Ike Broflovski was in all senses the consummate prodigal son. He was, initially, Welsh; Gerald and Sheila had found him, at four days old, in an orphanage in Cardiff. Often Kyle complained about his boring family holidays in Britain, which Sheila felt were necessary to maintain her precarious position as a female American MP, or something. She was politically minded at all times, that woman. Anyway, I do not doubt that Cardiff in the early 1950s was no place to have fun for a 6-year-old boy, and yet I was certain Kyle really didn't remember. (He got to go to New York City once a year as well, which sounded at least in his recollections to be the most exciting city in the world.)

So at 6 Kyle gained a little brother, a beady-eyed boy named Isaac by his adoptive parents, although he always went by Ike. I first met him as a sullen young teenager in the mid-1960s sitting on his bed listening to some kind of garage-sounding LP on headphones, noise escaping them audibly. He looked at me with profound disgust written on his face, and without removing his headphones he said, "Your hair looks ridiculous." Then Kyle shut his door and said, "Ignore him," after which we sat on his bed and humped for three hours.

Now Ike was 30, studying medicine at the University of Manchester, and having never been to Manchester I was not sure what to make of that fact — except that I knew Ike resolutely despised it. Still, he made the trip home, short though it was, as infrequently as possible. Ike, tall and gangly with unkempt charcoal hair and little brown eyes, had disappeared somewhere in the interim between the sullen garage-rock period and the surly medical period. Toward the end of our third year, Kyle rang me up frantic one night, explaining through inarticulate sobs that his brother had run off and no one knew where to.

When Ike reappeared, he was 18. It was 1970, and the boy was inked with jagged lines burned into his upper arms in what appeared to be biro. Upon close inspection even at present, the smallest traces of this mystery life lingered, most visible in the healed-over holes in the lobes of Ike's ears. Unlike the rest of his family, hard-line but hardly radical Labour-supporters, Ike was an outspoken Tory. On election night May 1979, Gary and I had been invited to some garden party at Kyle's parents'. As Ike was the only one in attendance in Thatcher-regalia, Gary had asked him why he leaned that way. He became very quiet and serious: "I have looked the heart of liberal England in the eyes, and it is not a healthy set of eyes," he's said, whatever that meant. "I've seen those people at their worst, you know. I've seen things. You don't want those people leading this nation."

"But your family!" Gary exclaimed.

"Well, they're misguided. Special interests, you know. But radical bleeding-heart liberal elitists who thing they're better than everybody?" Ike shrugged. "And the Irish can blow themselves up for all I care. Catholicism is irrelevant. God save the Queen." Rather uninformed, but that about summed it up.

When Ike noticed Kyle and I ogling him in the foyer, he sauntered over. "Oh, you cut your hair," he drawled at Kyle. He sounded so bored. "That's interesting. You do look a bit more like a man now, although I suppose I understand if you feel it isn't as glamorous, or something." Ike shook his head. "Or whatever," he added.

Kyle just glared at him, crossly. "I think deconstructing everything you've just said would make me burst into tears. So thank you, glad you like the haircut. But really it was a fluke and I _am_ growing it back out."

Ike eyed Kyle up and down, wrinkling his nose and stretching his left arm behind his head. "Well, whatever. Nice waistcoat."

This made Kyle beam. "Thanks. I had it made in the spring off some shop I forget the name of, actually, but the tailor was so lovely, he told me I had a waist like the Princess of Wales' and then he offered to—"

"Oh, Kyle, _no_." Ike waved a hand in his brother's face. "I don't actually _care_."

"Oh." Kyle sniffed. "I see. I didn't make it with him, if that's what you thought."

"Right."

Yawning, and without having said so much as _hi_ to me, Ike walked away, slipping into the kitchen, from which we heard his mother squeal, "Ach, my little one!" and Ike mutter in reply, "Yes, hello."

XXX

Dinner was clear, golden chicken soup with hard wedges of carrot bobbing around in shimmering patches of oil, followed by cold spears of asparagus, a crumbling chalk of mash, and moist, rich brisket. It had been cooked so long and at such a low temperature that the strip of fat peeled right off the spine of the meat. Kyle ate with enthusiasm, hardly pausing to breathe, while Ike sat in a stoic funk with his arms crossed, every so often assembling a forkful and chewing it slowly with a look of utter disgust. I liked the beef, and ate seconds, while I found the potatoes unbearable. They could have used something dairy: milk, cream, butter — anything, really. When Kyle noticed I wasn't eating my vegetables, he began to just fork them right off my plate.

This whole thing was preceded by a short ceremony of a sort, in which Sheila put a napkin over her eyes and chanted something while lighting two candles. Then, holding a glass of wine steady for about 10 minutes, Gerald sang something very mournful, which held everyone's attention. This ritual was not new to me, but I still found it foreign, up until the very last moment when Kyle tore a piece of woven egg bread off a loaf and handed it to me, smiling, and said, "_Shavua tov_. Certainly better than this one, I hope."

"Pardon?"

"Have a good week, have a good week," Gerald explained. "It means to have a nice week, the week ahead."

"Okay," I said. "Well, you too."

"Thank you, Stanley."

"Well, I try," I mumbled.

Gerald took a seat, at which point we all followed. The Broflovskis chatted all through dinner, which was the opposite of my silent, frozen family. After a few perfunctory questions to Kyle ("How's work, bubbelah?" "Oh, it's dreadful as usual." "Did you call your auntie?" "I will next week," and similar) everyone turned their gazes to Ike.

"What?" he asked, nibbling a crust of bread. "Don't you all _look_ at me."

"Well, then tell us how you are, sweetheart," Sheila implored him. "You never call unless you want something."

"Usually money," Gerald added.

"You could call _me_, you know, if it's so important."

"Leviticus chapter 20, verse 9. Deuteronomy chapter 21, verse 18—"

"Ugh, dad, I _don't care_."

"Well, see where it gets you." Sheila folded her hands in her lap. "Just tell us how you feel lately."

Now Ike looked really disgusted. "I need to finish this godforsaken year already," he said. "I am no longer sure what the point of being a house officer is, but I now know that indeed, I should have to be mad to want to work at a hospital."

"So what will you do?" I asked.

"Probably open a surgery or something." Ike shrugged. "I think that's where the money is. I would like to move back to London, but — well, depends on what Flora likes, I suppose."

"What's _she_ doing, then?" Kyle asked. "You never speak of her, really. Only brief mentions here and there."

"Yeah, well, what am I supposed to tell you about her? What we do in the sack? She's a goddamned receptionist, is what she is."

"Fair enough," Kyle said with a smirk.

Sheila cleared her throat. "That doesn't make me happy. You're seeing this girl, yes? So why do you talk about her like she's just some receptionist?"

Ike rolled his eyes. "Because she _is_ just some receptionist."

"Your mother's right, son." Gerald spoke slowly, like he'd been deliberating on this topic all day long. "Why do you want to see some non-Jewish girl who's just some receptionist?"

"You don't speak about her with respect, is all," Sheila added. "You want to find a girl you respect, bubbe, not some non-Jewish girl you think of as just a receptionist."

"Good lord, are you all going to grill me on this right now? I came to tell you what I thought you'd see as good news."

"Well?" Sheila asked. "Go on."

"Well, I asked her to marry me. And Flora, being desperate, said yes — of course."

All conversation at the table halted. Gerald dropped his silverware, and Sheila froze with her wineglass in mid-hoist.

"I said I asked my girlfriend to marry me and she accepted," Ike repeated. "Aren't any of you going to react to that? This family will parse to death any irrelevant scrap of information, but finally someone has something of substance to say at Sabbath dinner and everyone just stares at me."

"I'm happy," Kyle declared, and he did sound like he meant it. "Mazel tov, Ike, _truly_. When _is_ the wedding, anyway?"

"Yes, the wedding." Sheila was twisting her napkin in his hands. "Do you have a date yet?"

"I have to assume she's hammering it out with her parents right now." All eyes turned to Ike. "Well, next summer, I imagine. Isn't that when girls like to marry?"

"Ah, good." Sheila pretended to wipe her brow. "So that answers the question of whether or not this is an emergency."

"An emergency?" Ike rolled his eyes at his mother. "I'd get her an abortion before I married her."

"Have you?" Kyle asked. I laughed, but no one else did.

"Boys!" Sheila began to bang her dessert fork against her water goblet, as if part of a Parliamentary procedural. "Enough!"

"I have a question." Kyle cleared his throat. "Ike, this is _so important_. May I bring a plus-one?"

"What?" Ike asked. "Sure, bring whoever. It doesn't matter to me."

"Really?"

"Well, yeah, what do I care?" Ike shrugged. "Bring whomever you like. It's not my concern."

"But Flora…" Kyle waved his hands, like he was attempting to clarify something he needn't articulate: "She understands? You've … discussed it?"

"I don't much see what there is to discuss." Ike crossed his arms. "You do what you have to do, Kyle. I've mentioned it, I suppose, but you can't ask someone to just accept something like that. Nevertheless, we're brothers, I suppose."

"You suppose?" Sheila gasped, clutching her chest. "_Ach_, God, _my children_—"

"Mom, don't." Ike sighed, putting fingers to his temples, like the conversation was difficult to bear. "I didn't mean—"

Kyle was sitting with his elbows on the table, sleeves rolled up and fingers tented. For a moment I envisioned this was how he sat in meetings at work, intent and casual at the same time, cultivating a display of concentration. "I'm not offended," he said deliberately. "But I am rather full. I think I ate too much. My god, if it's not too much of one thing it's another. Perhaps I should just abstain from _eating_, too, Stanley, _hmmm_?"

Here I was caught off-guard. "No, don't do that," I offered cautiously.

"_Mmmph_. I suppose. Are you going to finish your brisket?"

Looking down at my plate, there was a neat pile of strips of fat, sparse bits of meat flaking off in one or two spots — but no real brisket left to speak of. "Ah — no," I answered. "No, I think I am finished."

"Do you mind if I eat that, then?"

I glanced down at the fat on my plate, to Kyle, and then back to the plate. "Um." Kyle was still resting his elbows on the table. "No, I … I suppose I don't mind."

Kyle gleefully ate.

XXX

Kyle's parents retired to bed immediately after dinner, something about waking up early to walk to religious services. "Are you sure you don't want to come?" Sheila had asked Ike before she went upstairs, combing her fingers through his hair.

"Ugh, _no_ thank you." He shook his head to free himself. "Last thing I need. Make Kyle go."

"Kyle went last month," she said.

"Oh, well, I cannot compare to _that_."

Sheila slapped him. "Don't be obnoxious!"

Ike was already bent over, laughing.

When his parents were gone, Kyle took three cans of Tetley's from the refrigerator and handed one off to me and one to his brother. With beer in hand, he got down on his knees and fished a key out from underneath the bookcase near the French doors that led to the back garden.

"They still keep it under there?" Ike asked. "How juvenile."

"Old people don't like to think of new places to keep things." Kyle slipped the key into the lock, twisting with ease. "Or at least Dad hates to."

We sat on the back patio. Without the lights on, it was pitch black outside, literally, but Kyle dragged a teak bench to the side of the house and lit the two gas lamps on either side of the doors. An eerie glow was cast around us, creating a pagan air to the conversation, which Kyle began by saying, "Ike, I am serious. Why _are_ you getting married?"

Ike scoffed. "Don't be jealous."

"I'm not jealous."

"Do not even lie. You want to get married _so_ badly. If you'd ever met Flora you wouldn't envy me at all. She's as sharp as a pavement, and roughly as thick."

"Then why are you marrying her?" I asked. "If I may butt in."

"Sure, butt in." Ike cracked the tab on his can of beer. "It's probably not your first time today."

"Don't be rude," Kyle chided.

"Don't assume I don't know, because I do."

"Know what?"

Ike shrugged. "I don't know. Look at the two of you."

"What am I looking at?" Now Kyle sounded exasperated. "I don't like cloying commentary! Out with it!"

"Well." Ike wiped at some phantom foam on his lips. "It's been ages since you've brought Stanley to dinner, hasn't it?"

"It's been ages since you've _been_ to dinner!" Kyle protested. "Away in Manchester, you leave me here to deal with these — _these people_."

"Don't act like you dislike it."

"Don't act like I do like it!"

"I just think, well, _Kyle_, your patterns. You only bring home boys when you _mean it_."

"And you never bring girls home and then you unenthusiastically announce you intend to _marry_ them!" Kyle shouted back. "What am I supposed to make of that? What are we supposed to _do_ with it? I don't even know who this girl _is_ and you want me to call her my sister-in-law?"

"I wouldn't ask you to call her that. Oh, Kyle. Don't be — just _don't_ be. It's quite fine to be envious."

"Excuse me," I said, raising a hand. The conversation was making me uncomfortable, and the first nighttime chill of August had caught me off-guard, shivering in shirtsleeves and wondering why we were not sitting in the parlor — probably so Gerald and Sheila would not hear the conversation. Kyle and Ike were bickering still, taking no notice of me, so I interrupted them: "Why the hell do you want to marry this girl? I mean, really. She sounds stupid and uninspiring and desperate to marry — and you're the only source of that information, so it's likely verifiable. So, really?"

"Yes!" Kyle echoed. "That is what I want to know!"

Ike was pouring the final dregs of his beer onto the brick pavers we were sitting atop. He sighed. "I just want to get married, is all. I don't really like any girl, so why not pick a girl who likes me?"

"Why do you even _want_ to get married?" I pressed. "Not getting married is an option."

"Oh, for _you_ both it's an option," Ike spat. He had crushed his beer can and it was now sitting on the table bent over itself, as if in pain. "But _someone_ has to reproduce in this family. Not to mention I am bored. Not to mention I _do_ like her. She's docile in public and sluttish in private, which — well, I don't know how else a girl is supposed to act."

"Suddenly I am not the fiercest misogynist you know, Stanley, am I?" Kyle asked. "Ike, that is _really_ appalling. _Liking_ a girl is fine but if you aim to marry you should try to find someone you're in _love_ with."

"But that has occurred to me," Ike countered, "and I increasingly feel that perhaps I am not capable of it. Like a girl, love a girl, it's all the most basic level of affection. This is the best I am going to do, and please don't decide to act like a 14-year-old and tell Mom and Dad. Or, well, tell Mom and Dad if you must. They already think I'm pathetic."

"Oh, I wouldn't do that," Kyle assured him, clasping a hand to Ike's shoulder. "After all, I do want to bring a date to the wedding."

XXX

"I thought I'd be much drunker than this," Kyle announced as we ambled down toward the Angel. In the dark, quiet Islington night, there was no one on the street, and only a sparse neon light or two illuminated while the upper-middle-class children of the borough slept soundly in their nurseries. "I should have drunk more," Kyle reiterated. "It's no good to leave a meal like that so lucid."

"I don't have a problem with it." I was not drunk, either, but I didn't care if Kyle knew it. I was beginning to forget that Gary had died, that it was for this reason that I'd been to Islington for dinner. I would forget, and then in dizzy horror something would trigger my memory, and then painfully the thought would fade until the next surge. The gaps in the cycle were widening, but I was unconcerned. Kyle was next to me, his arm brushing mine as we walked. I imagined that during the day he was warm in his work clothes, that the sheen of perspiration glossed his arms and chest. I thought of licking it off his stomach. This made me hard. We kept walking.

"I don't think I'll be able to catch a cab," he said somewhere around St. John Street. "And the Underground's probably closed by now. I haven't got my pocket watch on me, so I couldn't tell you what time it is."

"I believe it was nearing midnight when we left your parents."

"Ah, well, so the Tube is over. Mind if I come home with you?"

I stopped walking, and so did he. "Yeah, of course," I answered. "I'll lend you some pajamas."

"Oh, that's swell," he mumbled. "Pajamas."

"Certain you're not drunk?" I asked, although I was quite sure that he wasn't. I lamented internally that the wine at dinner hadn't been up to snuff, that I hadn't drunk more of it. We continued down St. John Street, passing closed-up storefronts primed to reopen in the morning.

Incidentally, in front of the seedy coffee shop I sometimes I cruised at, Kyle paused, and made a small noise in this throat that caught my attention. As I stopped and turned to him, he reached out to steady himself against the shop window. He frowned, and crouched down steadily to toy with his shoe.

"Sorry," he said. He glanced up at me. "I've been wearing these all day. They've just become quite uncomfortable. This should teach me not to change shoes before dinner."

I smiled at him, and he continued to poke at his loafers. "I could carry you, I suppose," I said. "I'm so sorry it's too late to catch a taxi."

"Well, I'm sure they're all caught up in traffic around the West End, ferrying tourists around at an infuriatingly slow speed."

"Right."

"Well." He stood back up. "You know all those tourists and their foreign money are good for the economy."

"Quite. I'm sure."

"Do you know I took care of part of that campaign last winter? Did I talk about it? Bringing overseas money to Britain is apparently something of a pet concern for certain Tory members of our constitutional government."

"And the liberals?"

"That's the thing about politics, dear. When your party is not in power, you exert the bulk of your energy on simply trying to keep yourself afloat. For all she talks about it I think my mother's spent the most time over the past five years trying to keep herself simply visible so she can hang onto her seat." Like being seen at the opera with her patrons, perhaps?

"Well, what's the point in that?" I asked. "I love your mother, darling, but there is simply nothing more despicable than two parties merely pissing all over each other's agendas, and grappling with the uncontrollable urge to harness power for no reason but to have it."

"You're just so cynically hung up on the downsides of government that you refuse to see the beauty in the process."

"No, Kyle. I love government. I hate _politics_. You see, this is why I cannot vote. The in-fighting makes me ill."

We walked a bit further up the road.

"Do you ever go into that coffee shop back there?" Kyle asked.

"What?" I asked.

"That shop we stopped in front of. Do you ever go in there?"

I was silent for a moment, deciding how I wanted to handle this. "I stop in from time to time for a coffee," I chose to inform him.

"Because I hear it's quite cruisy," he prompted.

"Oh. Well, I think I might have heard that, too."

"And it would make me sick to think that you're in there fucking random blokes, or using the glory holes or something."

I was silent on this point.

"You know," he continued, "I did once use one. A glory hole, I mean."

"Really?" I probed. There were few stories I hadn't heard in my 20 years of friendship with Kyle. Certainly I'd never heard anything about a glory hole.

"Oh, yes. At school, there was a really quiet shop immediately across the river from us. I kept hearing older boys talk about, well, _fairies_ visiting the shop, so one day I walked down and went into the shop to purchase a packet of crisps. Really I wanted to, oh, _explore_. It's not that I wanted to have sex, or anything. I mean, I was 13 years old. I suppose I was just curious. I'd never seen a cock, you know, other than my own. And I wanted to. What do you think of that?"

I was frankly shocked that he wanted my opinion. "I think it's only natural. I'm sure even a boy growing up straight would have been curious about something like that."

"A boy growing up straight would have ignored it. What would you have done?"

Again, I shrugged. "I don't know," I admitted. "I was fucking my pillows and pretending it was a certain son of my mother's friend from the time I was 11 years old. I'm sure a real penis would have interested me."

"Well, I did see a real penis, actually. After the first time — and the second time — I simply bought my crisps and ran back to school, hyperventilating. The third time — well. The third time I crept behind the shelves of packaged pastas and Fairy Liquid — I'm aware of the irony — and went into the loo. There were two toilets, and I could tell a man was in one of them. So I went into the other, and tried to look through the hole —and before I knew it he'd, like, almost put his fingers through, but not really, they were just touching the hole. So I touched back, right, and he — I don't know, he put his cock through. I nearly threw up on myself. I'd never seen one that wasn't mine in real life, except I suppose for Ike's when he was a baby. It was all pinched-looking, and I'd never seen an uncut one before, so that was quite a shock."

"Well, what did you do?" I asked. Having never heard the story I was curious. Kyle had plenty of disturbing experiences at school — some of which he'd admitted to me over the years, and many of which Ike had done.

His face went red. "I don't know, I touched it — I guess I put it into my mouth."

"Jesus." I stopped walking, and so did he. "Kyle, what do you mean you _guess_? How does one not remember something like that?"

"Fine, I don't _guess_, I remember putting it into my mouth."

"And what happened next?" I asked.

"What do you mean what happened next? I had a penis in my mouth, what do you _think_ happened next? He fucked my mouth!"

I laughed, having to pause to do so without tripping over myself in the dark, as the nearest streetlamp was apparently out.

"It's not funny!" Kyle protested. "I was terrified! I ran out of the shop weeping, and never went back."

"I wish I'd known you at 13," I said when I stopped giggling.

"No, you _don't_. My adolescence was miserable. Utterly wretched." We had begun to walk again, passing murky pools of gutter run-off and puddles of sick; the streets were virtually deserted but retained the relics of Friday-night passers-by. "I hated myself, Stanley. I just completely hated myself."

"Fair enough," I conceded. Having not hated myself quite so intensely — I reserved my anger for my parents and sister, immersing myself in keeping comprehensive and pathetic vitriolic journals — I wondered if, perhaps, had I known Kyle as a youth, he might have been less miserable. But to have known Kyle, I would have been attending his ancient and well-established public school, which likely have made me as miserable as he was.

When we arrived at my flat, Kyle darted up the stairs in front of me, and I wondered about his aching feet pounding up the concrete staircase. Once inside, I slammed the door and reached for the light switch, but was caught unaware and found myself forced unguarded into a tight embrace. Lips against mine, I was a prisoner to the doorframe. Never one to turn down a good snog, however, I opened my mouth, wondering where Kyle had found it in himself to be so dominating, why his mouth tasted only faintly of beer, and what I was going to say when he drew away. As he did so, my mind was reeling.

"Darling," I said softly, inching fingers against his hairline. "I think you're drunker than you think you are."

He shook his head. "I'm not, Stanley. I'm completely sober."

I was too. It felt uncomfortable. I wasn't sure what to do or say, and Kyle was still holding me against the door to my flat. Being much stronger than he was, I could have disposed of the situation with little effort, and yet I did not.

He tightened his arms. "Will you please do me the honor of being my plus-one to Ike's wedding? I'll kill myself if you decline, I really will."

"Of course I'll be your plus-one."

"You'll be my date?"

"Yeah."

In the moonlight streaming through the big, dusty windows, the batting of his lashes made just the most graceful, brief shadow. "I really mean like a date-date. … God, I must sound so girlish."

"Well, the date hasn't even been set, and who knows when that'll be. But, yes, certainly. I'd love to go."

"It'll probably be out of town. She's from Wigan, or something. Would you go out of town with me?"

"I would go anywhere with you."

His heart was pounding in his chest, and so was mine — out of sync, but every few beats they did manage to meet up, and in between one of these sets of matching heartbeats he tipped himself up against my body, and kissed me again on the lips.

Kyle and I kissed often. We kissed hello at the Bucky, we kissed good-bye if one of us stayed over. I kissed him with tongue at midnight on New Year's Eve 1982 and he kissed back, haphazardly, with visible granules of cocaine clinging to the downy hairs on his upper lip. We kissed when we graduated university and we kissed sometimes when one of us was upset. A gay man could kiss his best friend every day of his life and it would be less romantic and certainly less sexual than kissing his own mother. I couldn't remember the last time I kissed Kyle on the lips because it had probably been really recent.

This one was different.

Our mouths fluttered together, wide open, tongues not meeting. I realized my eyes were shut, and I opened them to see one of his snap shut. Drawing away, his cheeks were red. I had to bolster my balance against the doorframe, and snapped the light switch on behind me. Kyle was blushing much deeper than I had imagined in the dark.

"You are smitten with me," he said. "Don't deny me. Admit it."

I didn't know what to say. This was the moment I'd been dreading my entire adult life. "All right."

"Well, that wasn't so bad, was it?"

"Excuse me?"

He let go of me, and I slumped back against the door. "All this time, Stanley. All you had to do was _say it_."

"_Excuse me_?"

"You heard me." He sighed, falling into the chair at the head of my wood-block kitchen table. "Come sit down," he beckoned me, crooking his finger.

"I don't know if I want to," I replied.

He rolled his eyes. "Fine, then, don't come sit next to me. Listen." He put his head in his hands. "I am glad Gary is dead. I mean — oh, bollocks, that makes me sound mad and insensitive. I'm not—insensitive, I mean. Perhaps I'm a bit mad. … Or reverse those. I'm not sure any longer. Listen to me babbling like an idiot." He laughed, bitterly. "Oh, you have no idea. _Stanley_. For three years I've been tortured by the idea that a phantom blond man was going to swoop down on this island and steal you away from me. The day he left I wept for hours, just out of happiness. I _hate_ it when other people have your attention. You're mine, do you know?"

I walked toward him. My arms were crossed. "Well, what was I supposed to do?" I threw my hands up. "Kyle, you've dated so many men it's made me dizzy."

"Well, you've fucked so many I'm shocked you've only had one case of syphilis."

"I've had the clap a few times," I admitted. "But mostly I do use protection. I didn't really mean to come in anyone who wasn't you. Honest."

"It's okay." Kyle rapped his fingers on the table. "But it does make me a little sad. What am I talking about? It's not _okay_, all right, you understand me? It hurts me, you know."

"What does?"

"That you sleep with so many men!"

"Oh," I said stupidly.

"_Oh_? Is that all you are going to say to me, _oh_?"

"Well, what do you want me to say?"

"I want you to apologize!"

"For what?" I asked.

"I — I'm not sure."

I decided to take the seat next to him, sighing as I did. "I find it difficult to believe I am only 37. I feel I've lived at least twice that long."

Kyle snorted. "That's funny. You won't be 37 until October. Do you remember what we did for my birthday?"

"I don't know. Probably something with Christophe."

"Oh, Christophe." Kyle nodded. "You know, I'd forgotten about him."

I hadn't. The memory of meeting that man, Gregory, made my heart seize for a moment. Then I caught my breath. "He's irrelevant, darling. Just another man, you know." I turned to him; although his features were mostly obscured in the nighttime, the moonlight through my windows still caught his lashes. He looked very fetching, if pale. I took his chin in my hand, in a pose that echoed what I imagined a Victorian photocollage to look like. "I wouldn't be that kind of man."

He gulped. "What kind of man would that be?"

Without pausing, I answered, "One who leaves."

"Oh." His hands grasped onto me, one to my thigh and one to my flank. I was wearing a gauzy, taupe-colored button-down shirt — out of the ordinary for me, unusually formal, but something about dinner with Kyle's parents made me fall in line. The material was so thin that it nearly disappeared between my skin and his fingertips.

* * *

So, as I was formatting this so I could post it, I realized I missed including a big plot point that I had been kind of excited about. Oh well. Next chapter?

Thanks for reading! I love writing this story so much. It's my favorite.


	5. Chapter 5

Kyle was not there when I awoke, which did not surprise me at all, even if it was somewhat disappointing. I was nonplussed, on the other hand, to see that he'd done his side of the bed up, and when I say 'his side of the bed' I mean this in the least ostensible way, because I did remember us sleeping latched together on what I suppose was _my_ side, hands plastered to each other's flanks like potter's ribs in wet clay. Kyle was sweaty in his sleep, which made me damp in turn, and for some reason I was wearing nothing. For a moment, I was horrified that there might be a fire alarm at any moment and I would burn up trying to get my pants on. The thought of my flesh incinerating was enough to get me out of bed, tossing on some pajamas before I went downstairs.

My second surprise of the day, after the half-made bed, was that Kyle had not left my flat at all; he was, rather, in the kitchen, wearing a set of my pajamas, standing over the stove. "Morning," he said very jovially. "I am making you breakfast."

I gave him what must have been a very odd look, because he gave me one back, and I said, "Okay." There was a moment in which we stared at each other, and he dropped his stupid smile and looked very dejected, at which point I cleared my throat and pointedly asked, "Why?"

Then he perked up again. "You need a nice breakfast, dear. I've got the kettle on, and we're having eggs and toast — although your bread's a bit stale, Stanley. Maybe we should go to the market later or something. Anyway, salt, pepper, butter, it's all on the table." I just kept staring at him. "Have a seat," he said warmly, although I definitely caught the edge of threat in his voice. I did what he said, and felt like my mind was swimming.

This was very surreal for me, and all I could think about was the sex we'd had the night before — not so much that it had happened, but that it had been painfully sober all around, with no pretense; just two men perspiring in each other's arms, and now he was making me breakfast. On top of _that_, Gary was still dead, and each time I thought about one of Kyle's budding nipples brushing past my forearms, I remembered how painful it had been reconciling my ability to love two men at once, or juggle my affection for them both around and around until one of the balls dropped. What was I doing?

Kyle served breakfast, which was preceded by a cup of tea. His eggs had hard, very crumbly yolks, which had never been my preference, but having lived with his family one summer, I knew very well that Sheila Broflovski overcooked eggs. I suppose Kyle, therefore, had an emotional taste for dense yolks —I in no way doubted that he could cook a loose egg that wouldn't give the eater salmonella.

At first, while eating, we were both very silent, and then he managed to ask me, bluntly, "What was last night?"

I felt myself blushing. I felt myself cringing. "Oh," I said. I felt very irresponsible. I wanted to blink away tears that weren't there. "I think we just … I don't know, it's happened before," I wagered. "Didn't you like it?"

He nodded, slowly, picking crumbs of egg yolk off the sleeves of my pajama top. "I loved it," he said in a hoarse voice. "I feel awful, though. Here I am, making an effort to be celibate, and I've gone and seduced my best friend while he's emotionally vulnerable." He sighed, and leaned back in his chair. "I hope you can forgive me."

I let my knife clatter onto the plate. "Forgive you?" I asked. "Darling, you haven't _done_ anything. I had the most wonderful time last night."

"But, Gary," he reminded me, as if I had forgotten.

"Well, Gary is dead. What's it to him if we fuck?"

"But … you should be distraught!"

"Well, I'm certainly not happy about it. But my emotions can hardly be expected to follow a script! No one I have ever had even an inkling of concern for has ever passed away, you know. I just need to … figure it out, I guess."

"You could speak with Miss B," he suggested.

"Oh, no, forget _that_. I don't want to talk to her."

"But she's been through it!"

"Kyle!" I slammed my hand down on the table, which caused my flatware to rattle further. "I haven't lost a _spouse_, all right, I haven't even lost a lover. It's just a man I fell in love with once, and lived with once, who put me through the ringer, and now he's dead."

"Yes! Dead!" Kyle reminded me. He was beginning to sound hysterical.

"Well, that's what happens. He's dead, and it is _very_ confusing, but I needn't be forced into one of your mother's emotional analyses."

"Well, are you going to go to the funeral, Stanley?"

"I don't know. Look, his family does _not_ want me there. Whichever lovers he's had since moving back to Colorado, I am _sure_ they don't want me there. I am not even convinced _he_ would want me there. All in all, considering I was the depraved bastard who led that lovely young Mormon missionary astray, let's consider the feelings of every single other person who would mourn him."

"I am just trying to be helpful."

"You are being very, _very_ helpful," I tried to assure him.

"Everything I do is wrong."

"No, everything you do is not _wrong_, darling. You are single-handedly holding me up in this very uncertain moment, and this breakfast is delicious," I lied, because it wasn't to my liking. "So, let's enjoy some butter and toast and then go grocery shopping."

"I really don't know what I'm doing," he muttered, rising gingerly.

I decided now was a good time to eat some egg. The mood in the room (or whatever one calls it when one's space has no walls) made me feel as if we were both strapped to the masts of great Grecian ships surging toward each other on opposing currents. I was chewing egg — trying to get some crushed yolk off the roof of my mouth with my tongue, actually — when he sat down squarely on my lap.

"Hello," I said. "Can I help you?"

"Yeah," he breathed, before crushing his lips into mine in an unexpected albeit not uninvited way. I felt embarrassed for a moment as we readily opened our mouths together that actually, I was mid-meal and still had some residual food in my mouth, but then all sorts of reassurances began crashing through my consciousness: He knew I was eating, and he decided to get into my lap anyway and begin snogging me madly, all the while grinding his erection into my thigh.

My cock was aching and my head was singing, but I had to take a moment to swallow. His arms were slack around my shoulders, and I was feeling very foolish for neglecting to shave before coming downstairs. But he hadn't shaved either, and I guess this friction wasn't altogether unpleasant, the way our jaws moved together in time with his cock grinding into mine, finally, as I inched to the left. When he reached that moment where he couldn't breathe any longer, he pulled away, letting some saliva, thick with softening yolk, linger on my lips. On a tight exhale, he gasped out, "Fuck me."

He was still rolling his hips back and forth, frotting against me in an unbearable rhythm. I really didn't have an answer for him, so I just let forth a very inelegant moan, drawing it out about as long as I could.

"Yeah, no." He moved his right elbow to my shoulder, and brushed his forearm against my ear. There was a scary foreboding in the room, despite the very sunny day pouring in through my expansive, dirty windows. The angst and pathos of the two of us staring at each other might have driven me to tears if he hadn't said, in a husky way, "I feel very empty this morning." He batted his eyelashes. "And I want you inside of me." I opened my mouth, and I still had nothing to say. "Fuck me, Stanley. Go on." I swallowed. He put a finger to my mouth. "_Please_?"

"Well," I said. He was already slipping pajama bottoms down to his mid-thighs. "There's, um … I mean, something for lubricant, it's upstairs, in the—"

"Well, never matter." He yanked on my pajamas now, and I took the hint and lifted slightly off the chair, just enough for him to tug the waistband down around my knees. I grabbed him by the shoulders, and he turned around to look at the table. "Oh, it was just here a moment ago. … Oh, right." I should have known it was the butter he wanted, a fat brick of genuine English salted butter, golden foil wrapper clumsily folded over where he'd taken some to make eggs and toast. "I should say this'll do," he said dreamily, palming a handful of the stuff and, without blinking, smearing it lovingly on my cock.

"_Christ_," I gasped, drawing out the hiss in the 'S.' I felt blood surging, naturally, as he coated me up and down, smears of butter getting wiped off inadvertently in a faint nest of pubic hair. It was very slick, and it did smell like a creamery, but all it took was one greasy twist of his palm to banish all thoughts of whether or not this was a good idea. It suddenly seemed like a wonderful idea, a perfect idea, the sort of idea happiness could be built on.

I locked an arm around his neck and drew him in. "That's excellent," I said into his ear. "Keep going."

"Well, you're awfully greedy." Kyle pulled off of my cock and my jaw at the same time. "What about me?"

I reddened, because, well, if we were going to have some kind of pastoral mutual masturbation session with dairy products, it was only fair he get a turn. "Pass me whatever's left and I'll do you."

"Oh, no thank you." He took another handful of butter, clenched his index and middle fingers into it, and then proceeded to sort of use his other hand to masturbate those fingers. Satisfied, he waggled his butters-coated fingers in my face. "Want a taste?" he asked. I shrugged, and he let me dart my tongue out to lick some. Then he shrugged, and with a grunt, he very coarsely lifted his arse up and, to my immense surprise, shoved his two greasy fingers in.

This caused my eyes to bulge out. Among other things.

How does one begin to describe something like that? It was scintillating. It was maddeningly erotic, because there was that one element of the unexpected, or the unsanctioned. He was making the most expressive faces, too, biting his lip and clenching his eyes and very clearly enjoying it. Before I could will myself to beg him to touch me again — my cock was literally weeping for contact, being forced to deal with this wanton man so close — he removed his fingers and, in one fluid motion, entombed my member. Both of us gasped, and he grabbed me by the ears and pulled me into another kiss. I could feel his fingers trailing butter into my scalp.

He did all the work, bucking and heaving on top of me in a lovely, pathetic sort of way. I lost all will to do anything other than let my tongue entangle with his while he rode on my cock, repeatedly impaling himself.

I cannot possibly know how long it all went on for. A few minutes, possibly, as I was quite ready to go from even the slightest stroke of foreplay, but it may have been hours, and it wouldn't have made a damn difference to me. As I was languidly enjoying this display of previously unknown amour on Kyle's part, he stopped snogging me, and began to moan against my mouth.

I knew that moan. I knew what he wanted. I tried a quick glance down and saw his cock struggling between us, trapped between different sets of cotton pajamas. I reached around him to the table and with only a brief flinch of hesitancy, got my own handful of butter. Within a few moments of this, everything went off: His cock in my hand, his seed mingling with dairy in the creases between my knuckles. Before I knew it, I was coming too, burying my head in his chest and widening my mouth.

For a moment, he cradled my head, but I felt odd, because the position was uncomfortable. So I pulled away and out, and gazed into his eyes with their raw appeal and delighted in each of his shuddering breaths. I was shuddering too, and I felt myself smiling. I wasn't certain if it was polite to smile in the afterglow anymore, but I felt just delightful about everything for a moment. Then, after a choke, Kyle shut his eyes and burst into tears.

He fell onto my shoulder, and wrapped his arms around me. He was sobbing, just absolutely sobbing, and I felt the tears moistening my neck.

"Darling," I said carefully. My hands were both greasy messes, but I rubbed his back anyway. "I'm so sorry," I breathed, trying to keep him balanced on me while he wept. "I'm so sorry," I repeated. "I … I…" Well, I didn't know what to say. All of it was rather out of the ordinary. "Sweetheart, what are you crying for?"

"I'm sorry," he managed, but it was warbled. "It's taking advantage."

"What is?" I asked.

He clenched himself against my cock, which, in its softened state, was still half stuffed inside of him. "This," he choked. "It's wrong, it's not fair."

"How is fucking you not fair to me?" I asked despite my better judgment because I was certain I did not want to know, precisely.

"It's not fair to anyone." He lifted himself off of my chest, and with a jolt he began to get himself up off of my lap, but then he sat back down, sliding a bit closer on the greasy aftermath on my pajama bottoms. He wiped his nose with a sleeve. "I do not know why I insist on doing this to myself. Or to you. Or, or…" he trailed off, and collapsed on me again. "I'm so sorry, Stanley."

"Please don't be sorry." I took one hand off the small of his back and used it to stroke his cheek. "I adore making love with you, darling. Even if I need to buy a new brick of butter now, it's worth it."

"It's very wasteful."

"Shhh, no, it's not." I kissed him gingerly on the bridge of his nose, and in the corner of his eye, and on his bottom lip. He met my lips with his tongue, and soon we were dryly feasting in a stilted, welcome rhythm. Then he drew away again, and I said, in a creaky voice, "Death is not programmatic, you know, it's random. You cannot predict it. If I cannot spill any additional tears over Gary now it's because I already mourned his loss when we ended things, and I haven't dwelled much on it since. Do you see me pining for him?"

Kyle shook his head. "It's not only that," he said. "Although it is that. It's this…" He bit his lip. "That dreadful Douglas poem, you know, it's still true. It has been 100 years and we have come so far and yet … it's still true." He wiped one of his eyes, and finally crawled off of me. Gingerly he put a hand to his bottom, grimaced, and pulled up his pants. Sitting down, he said, "I'll pay for your laundry bill."

"Oh, don't bother," I said, waving it away. "Life is just a series of random, tragic events. I really don't care if some pajamas get ruined in the process."

He put his elbows on the table and sighed. "Do you care for a shower? I think we both need one."

"Certainly."

"I mean, together."

My eyebrows arched. "If you like."

"Yeah." He tapped his foot against the floorboards. "I'd like that very much." And after a swift glance to over to me — butter and semen smeared across my half-bare thighs, bottoms crumpled and top pushed to my ribcage, hair absolutely destroyed — he shrugged, grabbed a piece of toast off the plate in front of him, and helped himself to a dollop of butter. I watched him do this, wondering how he could just eat like that immediately after sex, a crying jag, and a florid Victorian poetry reference. With a full mouth, he said, "Really, Stanley, we've got to get you to the market. After we shower and dress we'll drop off your laundry, and swing by some grocery, maybe Tesco. Is that what you've got around here?"

With my jaw hanging open, I nodded, slowly. "Yeah," I managed to croak. "It's not too far."

Wiping the crumbs from his lips, he smiled. "And you have to eat something, dear."

"I think I'd prefer just to get something for tea later, a sandwich or something," I managed.

"All right, then, this is an excellent plan." He said this in a way that assured me I would not be deviating from it without his consent.

XXX

When it came down to it, Kyle was predictable in his devotion to the last bastions of the British aristocracy. It was funny, in a way, that the only person I knew to actually take cars everywhere and shop at Fortnum and Mason was a homosexual half-American Jew. His mother certainly didn't shop there. The summer I stayed with them I learned promptly that there were to be no pig products brought into the house, and we must never drink a glass of milk with our prime rib, and god forbid we should mix the two sets of dishes, or Gerald Broflovski would set off on an unending lecture about the categorization of sets of china.

Perhaps the first time he informed me I was genuinely uninitiated to this antiquarian outlook on the adherence to moral dietary codes. By even the second time I was beginning to unintentionally sigh in resignation when he got out the family Bible, or whatever the Jews called it, because of course they couldn't just say the standardized name for any particular concept, and then read me the various passages on scripture pertaining to why we weren't to eat that way. Afterward Kyle would look at me sympathetically and sigh, "That's what it was like growing up here, you know," and take me out for a steak-and-stilton pie with jellied eels.

By mid-July he had brought me with him to Fortnum and Mason. He encouraged me to buy a half-pound of Scottish smoked salmon, and then we took it into St. James's Square and we sat on a bench in our tight trousers eating it with our fingers. "My mother would kill me if I brought this into the house," he reasoned. "It's just salmon, but it has to be killed a certain way and gotten from a certain fishmonger. I will never impose this on my household or my family, or, or—" His voice hitched, and he peeled another piece of fish off of the foil-wrapped cardboard with deliberate carefulness. "Well, I suppose I'll never have anyone to impose it on. So fuck it all, really. I'm so sorry my father cannot bring himself to stop lecturing you. There are so many delicious things in this world that Judaism would not generally approve of."

"Example?" I asked, distracted by the majesty of the buildings around us.

"Well, homosexuality, for one. There's a passage on that, too."

"Oh no," I said summarily. "Has he read you that one?"

He shook his head and ate his piece of fish before answering, "No, he never has."

I am sure it would be cliché to claim that I was able to pinpoint the very moment in which I fell for him. I am well aware that I just couldn't do that — there were too many moments like this in which he sighed, his full lips settling into a miserable shape, and I could feel between us the unspoken pain of knowing there was something in the universe keeping the two of us from settling, either together or separately. I think this is the closest I have ever gotten to internalizing what love really is — knowing that the two of you share the same, deep-seated pain that you can never be rid of, and the closest you can come to healing is looking into the face of someone with the same sort of hurt and recognizing their agony as your own.

Moreover, I have always felt that love on its own is insubstantial, that to be truly _in_ love with someone, you must _like_ them; you must enjoy their company. Kyle and I had great fun that summer, going to the opera and touring the Victoria and Albert Museum. We stood in front of the great cast of the Column of Trajan, our necks aching from the strain of gazing upon the orderly twists of burly, half-naked German Barbarians and well-muscled auxiliaries. "Do you think I might have been a Classicist?" Kyle asked after a silent 10 minutes, during which time a young mother and her probably 7-year-old daughter glared at us menacingly from behind a row of sepulchers. I am not sure if it was because we were very clearly two gay boys wearing unsettlingly tight slacks, or if Kyle's disproportionate hairdo was blocking her view of the cast. "I think I would have done well with military history. All these strapping Germanics are making me feel a bit lascivious."

"I think something so large and obviously phallic has no place in your studies," I theorized. "Besides, you are so good with William Blake." And it was true; he had been walking around campus quoting Songs of Experience to anyone who would listen for the last month of the term. The first night I spent in his family's dining room, he read aloud his prize-winning essay on "Broken Marriage Vows and Smog: Reality and the Imaginary in Blake's 'London.' " It was the third time I had heard him read it, as he presented it once to our Enlightenment Literature tutorial, and once before the English department. He glowed as he read at the dinner table, stealing quick glances at his parents, hoping to notice some approval. Ike rolled his eyes throughout, occasionally making demonstrative yawning gestures.

After Kyle had finished, he turned to his brother and said, in a bruised tone, "So sorry to have bored you, Ike."

"You'll make it up to me somehow," Ike had said with a shrug.

Their father deigned to speak: "That was a very intelligent paper, Kyle. You must be quite proud of yourself."

"The English department is quite proud of me, actually. Are you proud of me, Stanley?"

I was 19, blushing, and suitably embarrassed to be in the presence of this odd, cultured, dignified family. With a nervous glance around the table, I smiled at my friend and said, "Of course."

"Good," Kyle answered. He set his napkin on his chair and began to clear the dishes.

XXX

So devoted was Kyle to this overpriced luxury grocer that by the time we were bathed and dried and dressed and generally recovered from our curious sex, he had decided we were going to make the trek to Mayfair to get me some bread and butter. It was not exactly far, but far enough to make a taxi seem a needless indulgence.

"But there's a market right over _there_," I weakly protested as he dragged me down the street to find a cab. "What's the point of paying someone else to drive us all the way across town? It just seems ludicrous, is all."

"Stop whining," he chided me, sticking his arm out to signal at one of those black behemoths he loved so well. "We both need food, and there's no better place to get it."

A taxi pulled up in front of us, and we climbed aboard. I hunkered myself down into the farthest seat, and Kyle curled up against me, hand on my chest.

"Green Park Tube," he instructed the driver.

"And what do you need food for, anyway?" I asked as we merged into traffic. I could see the driver squinting at us a bit too narrowly via the mirror.

"Why, tonight, of course," he said. "It's Saturday, or have you forgotten? I've got to feed you, and me, and Miss B, _Eric_, and that towheaded slattern you find yourself gravitating toward. I mean, feeding just Eric is something of an obligation."

"He's not a slattern," I said.

"Who, Eric? _Obviously_. Who'd have him?"

"No, the boy you just called a 'towheaded slattern.' He's not a slattern. He's just a regular old prostitute. … And he's not bad."

Kyle's eyes flew open as wide as they could go. "Oh my god," he said. "You are sleeping with him."

"Well, I didn't mean _in bed_! I meant he's just an adequate person, nothing awful or wonderful about him."

"You're sleeping with him!" he repeated. "That's why you're not upset about Gary's death — you're replaced him! Oh, this is bloody fucking magical. Was it before or after you found out? Did you fuck me and him both yesterday? Because I—"

I sighed. "Kyle, shut up. You don't own me. And I haven't _replaced_ Gary; they're entirely different people."

"I do now! And yes, you have!

I was relieved that he wasn't furious, but rather shocked. But then, I'd fucked an awful lot of people, and Kyle's week-long period of celibacy wasn't really a point of superiority for him, as much as leaping from one monogamous affair to the next was just a cloak for a wishful kind of promiscuity. After all, he'd apparently let Clyde pick him up while cruising some park — it was less a relationship than some tawdry sex he wanted badly to rewrite through the force of sheer will. Steadily the implication that he was going to expect some sort of monogamy occurred to me — but I didn't find it troublesome; it felt relieving.

"Is he good?" Kyle asked.

"I've had better," I admitted. "Good for a prostitute, I suppose — although I should admit he's my first prostitute."

"Does Eric know? And are you paying him?"

"No. And no." I felt this was less a lie than my own sort of aspirational overhaul. I never really gave him money — he just took it. And anyway — I had ended it.

"Oh, this is just dandy. Lord knows I can't compete with _that_. And to think — I felt I'd just won some magnificent prize." He sounded sad.

"I don't know what that means."

"It means I'll have to fight harder for your affections."

"Nonsense." I pulled him toward me and kissed him on the jaw line.

He sighed. "Let's not fool ourselves," he rasped. "Kenneth is a young, attractive boy who isn't _looking _for anything, except a screw and some dinner."

"Sure he takes cash," I mumbled.

"Details, details. It's all just stupid details. If I were you, I'd be physically drawn to him, too. It's not simply his scrappy little build or the fact that he's been making such eyes at you. … Oh, _Stanley_. Don't make that face. I know."

"I'm not making a face."

He was very quiet. "You … _need_ me, don't you?"

"I suppose I do."

"No man has ever needed me before."

"I find that hard to believe."

"Hard or not, it's certainly true. I'm not one to be needed. Wanted, maybe, and fucked, certainly, but no one really ever needs me. That's why I can't — why I haven't found anyone else … well, I don't know. You need me, but nobody else does. That's why you've never gone away. That's why every time I meet a new boyfriend you are lurking in the shadows. When you find a new boyfriend, you hold on to me just the same. No one else would do that. You do it because you need me."

Certainly I couldn't deny this. And yet discussing how I felt was one of my weakest skills. I had no inclination toward the self-psychoanalytic. This was something that annoyed me — if anything annoyed me — about Kyle. He yearned to make a mountain out of every molehill in Britain. Nevertheless, he was correct.

And when I didn't answer, he tucked in closer into me, kissing me on the jaw, and twice at the corner of my mouth.

In the reflection of the rearview mirror, I saw the driver gazing ahead intensely, perhaps trying to ignore what was going on in the backseat of his cab.

"Promise me you don't need that little boy," Kyle said. "I'm too old and too fat to fight for you, dear. I can't compete with some baby with perfect skin."

"Well, he hasn't got perfect skin," I replied. "And his teeth are all a mess. Darling, this is really foolish."

"Oh, you think I'm fat?" he asked.

"No."

"Well, you didn't deny it!"

In the rearview mirror, I could discern the driver snickering at us. "Kyle, this is too cliché to fathom. I don't have the mental energy to extol all of your virtues right now. It would take a lifetime to do that, as there are _so many_."

"Well, I think I am prepared at this juncture to provide a lifetime. So, why don't you attempt to begin?"

His lips were near mine, and in lieu of playing his insecure game I simply laid a kiss against them, which he proved receptive to, grasping me a little tighter. The driver was now visibly shaking with laugher at this, so I just closed my eyes and let him writhe against me. To be entirely honest I was so tired from fucking and drinking and grieving and overwhelmed with the sheer madness of Kyle attempting to scale my lap in the back of a taxi that I couldn't even call to mind what it was that I _liked_ about him. I was sure, however, that the fact that he could make me forget these things had something to do with it.

At Fortnum and Mason Kyle bought three pounds of smoked salmon and a jar of crème fraiche. He grabbed things off of shelves until his wicker basket was sagging in his grasp. "Here," he said, thrusting it into my hands. "Hold this for me, please, dear, wouldn't you?"

Kyle's bill was exorbitant and as he wrote a check for the cashier I contemplated how he could spend like this and remain so comfortable. I barely ate more than a packet of crisps, an apple, and a hard boiled egg on a daily basis. A long time ago I'd had to make a choice between drinking or eating lavishly, and to no great surprise I hadn't picked the latter. That Kyle managed to do both, and maintained a posh flat full of Baccarat and Afghani carpets, and had his waistcoats handmade in silk jacquard by tailors who apparently held royal warrants — it slowly dawned on me that he was really quite wealthy. (On the other hand, it did occur to me that often clients gave him these things out of courtesy, or diplomacy.) I liked bespoke clothing and nice things as much as anyone, but I had probably never spent more than five pounds on groceries in one go in my life. Kyle was spending 20 times that simply for a Saturday evening before going out.

Something about that saddened me, perhaps because I was also quite aware that he was dreadfully stingy, to the extent that he often found tiny ways to make me pay for his meals and drugs and alcohol. Given that I couldn't really afford my own meals, drugs, and alcohol — at least, not all three at the same time — I wondered where he got off spending like this for no particular reason, or if he was just self-unaware. With my eyes wide and the sack of food in my arms, I followed him outside to hail another taxi.

In his building's lift he pressed against me again, palming my dick through my trousers and crushing a cluster of hothouse tomatoes as he leaned into the bag to get closer to me. Once at his flat, he shed all of his clothing and put away all the groceries entirely in the nude. Unsure of what to make of this and desperate to fuck him again, I stood in his kitchen with my arms crossed, willing my erection to disappear, which of course it did not.

"I think you like me," Kyle sang, stepping off of a chair he'd been using to reach a platter on a high shelf. "You want to fuck me and kiss me and marry me!"

I laughed, but not in a derisive way. "Well, yes," I admitted. "Of course. In that order, obviously. One thing at a time." The first two proved easily enough accomplished in about an hour, followed by a shower, which he let me take first so he could do something or other to his hair. As I lathered my hands with his shampoo, which smelled ashy for a moment before I realized it was meant to be rosemary, I realized that I was somewhat relieved that the latter was quite impossible — the thought of it, so suddenly, just terrified me. In a wire basket hanging from his showerhead I spied bottles of liquid soap with French labels and a generous container of feminine douche, next to an enema bottle. That made me smile.

XXX

Kyle was dressing, and I was sitting on one of his couches, nursing a flute of champagne. He'd opened a bottle of Taittinger for us before putting the veal pasties in the oven on low to keep them warm. "This is very good champagne," he'd said, palming the phallic end of the bottle. "I've had it in the cooler for about a year now."

"So why waste it now?" I asked.

"It's just for us, of course." He shrugged. "It feels like the right time."

"I thought you were off of champagne after Christophe."

He raised an eyebrow. "Oh, my. Between all the drama, I keep forgetting about him. Why do you keep bringing him up?" He thrust the bottle into my hands, and its chilled, glassy surface almost caused it to fall from my grasp and shatter on the floor. "Careful, now," Kyle whispered, steadying the bottle between my fingers. From the counter, he produced an opener. "Won't you do the honors?"

I opened the bottle of Taittinger; it was a 1976 vintage, stiff and brisk in our mouths. Silently we drank, staring at each other, a clock on the wall ticking insistently like something out of a film. Shortly he dismissed himself to change out of the ill-fitting shirt he was wearing as a makeshift dressing gown, unbuttoned and long enough to cover his behind, but only just so. Through the cream-colored gauze of the fabric I could make out the shape of his arse clad in black briefs. If I hadn't had sex already twice that day I would have torn them off again and had him on the cocktail table.

I had finished a second glass when he reappeared. "It's a very nice night," he remarked, signaling his return in tight jeans and a white Aertex short-sleeved button-down. "Do I look all right?"

I nodded. "You always look all right to me." I put my drink down on the table. I thought for a moment, and emboldened, I added, "I think you look beautiful."

"That's kind of you to say." Sitting on the couch next to me, he crossed his arms. "You do realize that I'm very, very needy, of course. Where is that bottle of champagne? We should finish it before anyone else arrives."

I got up to fetch it for him, and brought him a new glass as well. "I wouldn't say you are needy," I said, and I heard the falsity, the brittleness in my own words.

"Please don't lie to me." Kyle sighed, and drank. The mood in the flat was indescribable, and I realized that for the first time in a very long while, I was no longer in safe territory.

"I think I deserve not to be lied to, and I know very well that I am very needy, and I suppose the thing I have always liked — or rather, loved — about you, Stanley, is that you are aware of this. Yet you treat me with a respect that I have not been given by anyone else save my father, perhaps. You are the only man who has _ever_ looked at me without contempt. Jealousy, lust, possessiveness — I don't mind those, so I forgive you for feeling them. But ultimately in a partner or a lover I think what I really want is someone who relates to _me_ as a partner, and I have never had that. All I have ever had is a series of brutes who may have been willing to fight for me, but fighting is hardly protection, because protection is emotional."

I didn't know what to do, so I took Kyle's hand. "Why now?" I asked. Further words weren't forthcoming. I think what I was feeling was an immense vulnerability.

He sniffed. "Do you know, I was waiting for you to do something. I'm not the sort of girl who makes moves; I enjoy being courted. But I think you've been courting me for years, to be honest, and suddenly when I heard about Gary…" He trailed off, allowing his words to fester between us, abandoned. He was frowning, somewhat more than slightly.

"Let us be cliché and attest to the fact that life is quite short, and I have spent much of it expecting us to have our day at some indeterminable point in the future. But I've recently been reminded that anything can happen — random, tragic things, like you say. So what's the use in waiting? When I was younger, 10 years ago, I consoled myself with the idea that I was in my youth, and that our great romance might commence later. But I am not really sure when there is going to be a later. This is life, isn't it?" He sighed, heaving his shoulders and tipping his head.

"To be honest, darling, I'm … well, I don't quite know what to say to you."

He squeezed my hand. "Well, Stanley dear, the very nice thing about love is that you really don't have to say anything. You aren't some blockhead like old Clyde. I trust well enough we have an understanding."

"It's been a while since I last had an understanding, you know. Actually, let's not forget that the last man I had an understanding with is dead."

"And another's married. So what?"

"Well, so this means either you're going to die, or get married, I suppose."

"Ha," he said dryly. "Life is very peculiar, isn't it?"

"It's peculiar indeed," I agreed.

He wormed his fingers out of my hand, and sipped champagne.

XXX

When Butters arrived we were on the sofa snogging, my hands barely brushing the warm skin of Kyle's torso underneath the straining buttons of his fitted shirt.

"Oh, hell," he spat as he pulled away — literally, saliva clung to his lips before he wiped them. "I wish they would all go somewhere else just for once." While he was answering the door, I did my best to quickly maneuver my erection around so that it wasn't quite so apparent between my legs.

When he walked into the room, Butters stopped and pointed and me and squealed. "You have been kissing! Don't lie, don't lie!" He began clapping his hands, something I hadn't seen him do in years. "This is so exciting."

"What?" I asked. At which point Kyle returned from the door with a bouquet in his arms.

"I have to put these in a vase," he said. "Butters, hasn't anyone ever told you it's simply impolite to hand flowers that need arranging to your hostess?"

"What?" Butters turned to Kyle, blushing, a hand over his mouth. "I, no, I haven't ever heard that."

"Well, it's true. Instead of enjoying your company, she has to go bother with arranging flowers!" For some kind of emphasis, Kyle stomped his foot. He was barefoot, though, and the effect of this gesture was adorable rather than audible.

"Do you want me to do it?" Butters asked.

"Oh, no, don't mind me at all. Please, have a drink. Stanley, be a dear and get Miss B a drink. I need a vase."

There was a bar in the corner; it was very 1950s, and Kyle followed suit by keeping it well-stocked. Often we didn't drink straight alcohol together, and generally Saturday nights were too celebratory for whisky or other stiff drinks. But Butters asked for a gin and tonic, which I fixed him in a Baccarat tumbler that caught light where it was aggressively cut.

As soon as he had his drink in hand, Butters thanked me, and said, "I caught you kissing, didn't I?"

I sniffed. "I don't kiss and tell."

"Well, that's true, you generally don't. But this time I think you should! It's wonderful, so I have to know. Please tell me."

"Is it obvious?"

"Well, I think it will dissipate shortly," Butters assured me, indicating my crotch. "But your lips — both of yours, I mean — are so swollen. And when he answered the door poor Kyle had that flushed look. And the marks on his neck, too. I don't think the collar quite hides them."

"Oh, those could be from anyone."

"No, they have to be recent. Broken blood vessels lighten to a kind of pink after a bit, and those are just too violet. Unless you've been hiding a third man in this apartment, that's your work." Again, he clapped his hands like a schoolgirl. "Oh, I know I'm right!"

"Fine, Butters, you win."

"Win what?" Kyle asked. He reappeared with the bouquet, now neatly if hastily arranged in an uninspiring manner in another cut-crystal vase. He set it on the windowsill and brushed some orange pollen from his hands; it settled onto his trousers. In the fading light of day, Butters' wildflowers looked lush and healthy — they were screeching magentas and violent greens, dusty pinks and ivories. Butters had some kind of eye for color coordination — but perhaps it did not apply to flora.

"I'm afraid Miss B is on to us," I told Kyle.

"All right." Kyle crossed his arms. "Why shouldn't she be?"

Thinking of Kenny, and solely of Kenny, I said, "The last thing we'd like is for Eric to make some kind of scene."

"A scene about _what_?" Kyle asked. "I don't give a damn about Eric. He's barely fond of you, and he really hates _me_, so what do you think he is possibly going to care if he knows we've been fucking a bit?"

"_Fucking_?" Butters asked, eyes widening.

"A bit? Darling, _twice_ today."

"I think my personal best is four," Kyle replied. "Can you beat that?"

"That was when you were 20!" I snapped.

"_Details_."

"And it's not as if you were doing the _work_, such as it is."

"Oh, it's _work_, is it?"

"Excuse me," Butters cut in. "Kyle, however many times it was today, and whomever you'd like to know, maybe you'd prefer the evidence of your liaison weren't so blatant?"

"It _is_ blatant?" Kyle touched his neck, as if he could feel this. "My god, how perfectly stupid would that look? Lord knows I'm really much older than 20. But I guess I might as well be, how we've been carrying on."

"Eric is doubtlessly on his way," I reminded my friends.

"Butters, does it look stupid? I don't want to look stupid."

"I would never say _stupid_."

"Can you help me?"

"I don't know. What kind of face makeup do you have?"

"I have some old foundation—"

"I think that'll do. Do you have anything green? It balances out redness, actually. I can cover it up, if you like, but if you perspire a lot it might run off. Have you got cream-based, or powder?"

Kyle looked lost. "Not sure, ah — both?"

"Oh, all right. We can combine them. That's a convenient trick I'm fond of."

"Butters," I said. "Where did you learn this about makeup?"

Miss B grinned, clasping her hands. "Twenty years of female impersonation, Stanley, and you learn _something_ about covering things. Beard lines in particular."

"Well, I don't have _that_, do I?"

Miss B shook her head. "Why, no. That is amazing, actually. How do you manage?"

"I shave thrice a day." Kyle was beaming, and he held up three fingers in illustration. "I don't know, I don't want to look too butch."

"_Kyle_," I said. "The _time—_"

"All right!" he cried. "Stanley, _Jesus_. You are unbearably naggy this evening." This was a ridiculous thing to say, as I'd spent the majority of the day with either his tongue or his cock in my mouth — nagging would have been quite impossible.

In any case, Kyle and Butters were busy fooling around with makeup in the bedroom when Eric and Kenny arrived, so I answered the door and offered them a drink.

"Don't bother," Eric croaked, pulling a packet of something from his jacket pocket. "I've a more attractive offer for you."

"I'll believe that when I see it," I said.

Kenny cleared his throat. "I would like a drink," he said, "_Stanley_."

"All right. What would you like?"

He narrowed his eyes at me. "Something expensive."

"Just tell me what you want to drink," I insisted. "I think Kyle has some Fuller's—"

"Where _is_ that miserable Jew?" Eric asked.

"He'll be along," I said. "He's with Butters."

Kenny pointed to the bottle of Taittinger on the counter. "I want that."

"That's champagne," I said. "Not an ale."

"Well, who said I wanted beer?"

"I just assumed—"

"Well, don't _assume_, Stanley," he sneered. "I can drink sophisticated things, too, actually."

"Fine," I said. "Help yourself."

Eric put his hands on his hips, which was the type of thing he did whenever no one was paying attention to him. "Come over here and look at this," he barked. "I have a proposition for you."

I walked over, head spinning. The evening was young and too much had happened; I was developing a looming sense of dread I could not place, although it may have had something to do with my suspicion that Kyle was talking to Butters without any kind of self-censorship mechanism in place. Moreover, Kenny's attitude was bothersome, although I had no idea why I should even care.

"What?" I asked Eric. "What is this you want me to look at?"

He held a brown paper package aloft and smirked. "This is manna," he said. "A gift from whatever god you believe in, you agnostic Catholic bastard."

I rolled my eyes. "Just tell me, Eric."

"Cocaine, naturally." He began to unwrap the package in his hands, and sure enough there was a fat baggie of it inside. "Our well-connected friend assures me this is the top of the line product, and he is usually accurate about these things, even if he prices his stuff like a Jew selling bread scraps at Treblinka." (I was sure _his_ well-connected friend was Damien, the drug dealer I tried to avoid to the best of my abilities, but Eric did have a way of talking about things like you knew what he was on about, when there was often little chance you had any idea.)

"So what's this to do with me?"

"I want to offer you some."

I rolled my eyes. "You make a worse drug dealer than you do an insurance salesman, Eric."

"I'll have you know I'm a fucking brilliant at what I do, which is why I can afford high-status trifles like this cocaine and that beauty over there." He nodded his head toward Kenny, who was pouring himself a glass of the Taittinger, attempting to appear as though he weren't eavesdropping.

"How much?" I asked.

"Let's not be crass. What are numbers between friends?"

"You are not my friend."

"How could you say something like that?" His indignation melted away. Now he seemed disappointed.

"Well, look, I'm broke," I told him. It wasn't exactly true, but it was true enough, and I didn't have any patience for this. "You can give me some cocaine gratis or you can go after Kyle and maybe he'll follow you down whatever demented path you're on at the moment but if you're looking to fashion yourself as some kind of second-tier drug dealer, go to hell."

"Drug dealing? Stanley, this is just smart. It's more like I need someone to subsidize this. And being _friends_, or so I thought, I thought we could reach some mutually beneficial arrangement. It's good stuff, you know."

"I don't care. I have no money." To demonstrate this, I pulled my wallet from my pocket and opened it up. "See, I have two fivers and a 20. That's it. That's all the money I have in the world right now."

He laughed at me. "Well, now who's pathetic at what they do? Wait, wait — I'm sorry. You don't _do_ anything. I'd forgotten."

"Go to hell, Eric. Pick on someone your own size. Or rather, since there's no one _alive_ as bloody fat as you, don't bother."

"Why don't you go ask the Jew?" he suggested.

"Fine," I said. Anything to get away from him.

I was about to be delighted to be out of his presence, but as I was halfway down the hall, Kenny said to me, "Where are you going?" It wasn't surprising, because I had a vague inkling of being followed, but the layout of Kyle's flat lent itself to someone creeping behind you undetected.

"To talk to Kyle and Butters," I said, sizing him up. He was holding a flute of champagne, cocking his hip against a wall in a fairly lurid manner, almost asking me to reach out for him. I didn't. "Anyway, you're not invited," I added, thinking he would understand and slink away, back to Eric and their sordid little situation.

"Oh, but I'd so much rather come with you."

"I suppose that's too bad, then."

He narrowed his eyes. "Just remember, Stanley. _I read people_." With that, he disappeared around the corner, perhaps back into the living room.

Knocking before I entered and receiving no response, I found Kyle sitting at the vanity facing Butters, who was on the bed. They were both giggling at something, but they stopped when they saw me.

"Look," Kyle said, pulling the collar of his shirt away from his neck. "I'm all fixed."

"Then why ever did you leave me stranded out there?"

"You can handle Eric, can't you?"

"I don't know." I shrugged. Both of them were looking at me. "He wants me to buy some cocaine."

"Well, you should," Kyle said.

Butters shook his head slowly, indicating grave disapproval.

I crossed my arms and leaned against the doorframe. "Look," I said. "I don't really want any of his bloody drugs and for that matter, I don't have any money."

"Just give him some food and he'll leave you alone. I left those pasties in the oven, remember? He can eat mine. That should shut him up." He paused. "Wait a moment. How is it that you don't have any money?"

"Haven't cashed my checks lately," I said. "I don't know, I got distracted with everything. I've 30 quid in my wallet and perhaps another six in change in my pocket. Although maybe it fell out when you tore off my clothing earlier." This wasn't so, and I could feel the heavy coins in my back pocket, but it was just as well I should remind him. "I don't even know what he wants to charge. He won't tell me! Which indicates I probably can't afford it. And I don't want any, anyhow."

"Smart man." Miss B nodded, folding her hands together. "I'll go talk to him. You can't leave him alone, really. Then he gets bored, and you surely don't want that. I'll go ask him what he had for lunch. That'll get him off your case. Excuse me." Butters slipped off the bed and took his leave of us.

Kyle got up off the vanity and came over to me, uncrossing my arms and wrapping them around himself. "I'll take care of it," he whispered. "Don't you worry." I assumed he was talking about the cocaine, but he just as well may have been referring to anything. I was sick of vagaries and wondering what it meant that Kenny "read people" and worrying about what was going to happen tomorrow when this night was over and it was Sunday.

Returning to the kitchen, where Eric was happily gnawing on a veal pasty and Butters was speaking at length about slum literature and antiquarian editions thereof, Kyle picked up the empty Taittinger bottle and said, "Oh," sounding very sad, or disappointed. "It's all gone."

"Yes, I had the last glass," Kenny replied. "Perhaps that was a mistake. It was so bitter! What gives?"

"Ah." Kyle sniffed. "I'm sorry you didn't like it."

"Who said I didn't like it? I liked it all right. It tasted _special_. Was it special?"

"Yes, it was." Kyle frowned.

"Well." Kenny was grinning. "Thanks for sharing it with me." He laughed, long and high-pitched, as if he had already been imbibing and snorting things for quite some time.

XXX

We all took a cab to Camp, Eric squashed in the back with Kenny and Butters on either side of him. Butters had to roll down the window to get the faintest bit of O\oxygen. Kyle and I sat in the jump seats, and he kept staring at me with these meaningful glances. I wondered if he was annoyed about the champagne, but there would be more champagne, and going out was the last thing I wanted to do, anyhow. The streets felt foreboding, with their yellow lamplight reflecting off the shuttered shop windows. We rode down around the park, down Pall Mall and somehow, up Shaftesbury. Butters had done a superior job with the face makeup, and indeed you couldn't make out my handiwork, especially not in the dim cabin of the taxi. It was sort of sad — I wanted to mark Kyle, somehow, in a way others could see. Very bothersome.

It was too early for a line. For about five minutes it seemed as though the night were about to become really enjoyable again after the stuffiness of the cab ride, but of course there in a cluster near the entrance stood Token, Craig, Craig's catamite, and old Clyde; Token looked sharp in a tight pair of seersucker trousers, which was unusual for him. (Whenever Token wore any kind of impeccable outfit, I had to assume it had been purchased, fitted, and assembled by Wendy, herself a devotee of French couture and British tailoring.)

I didn't notice them at first, but when the five of us walked into Camp someone shouted "Oi!" at our group from a few feet behind. At first when I turned to source this interjection I spotted Token and Craig, but it couldn't have been either of them shouting something so crass across a crowded room. (And I couldn't believe that the quivering slip of a boy Craig had with him was able to vocalize anything, let alone project to five feet away.) Then of course I realized that the drab-looking fellow with garish stitches down his forehead and brow must be Clyde; figures he would blend in with the crowd.

"Ohhhh, it's Clyde, is it?" Kenny noted. "Yes, I remember. From Her Majesty's Home Office."

"Indeed," I said quietly.

"Among other places," Kyle added.

"Oh, to hell with this," Eric whined. "We're not dealing with _Craig_. I _hate_ Craig!" With one arm, he shoved Kenny in front of him, and made him march toward our usual table; Kenny spared a backward glance at me, pressed his lips into a mocking goodbye pucker, and followed orders.

Butters, with a quaint shrug, said, "This just looks bad. If you'll excuse me?" And he set off after Eric and Kenny. "Come find us!" was the last thing we heard him cry.

So now there was nothing left to do than to approach them. Kyle took my arm, clinging to my slack bicep as we strode over.

Briefly, on the subject of His Grace, the Duke of Nommel: Craig Tucker had worn a bespoke suit each day of his life, or at the very least on each occasion of our meeting, which at Oxford was unfortunately quite nearly each day. He was wearing one tonight, and it made him look dignified and handsome, the gray color of the fabric so subtle it brought out the redness in his sharp, tawny eyes. But in no way was this fitting or appropriate attire for Camp, or indeed any nightclub, and I suppose it was just as well; Craig did not generally game _anyone_, save likely his little clique. I think the closest he had ever come to an actual affair may have been Kyle, after Kyle and Eric split up in our final year. Yet flirtatious as he could be, Craig was resistant to Kyle's every machination, and married a Lady Anne Polk one year after our graduation. She was dreary and grating, and got along much better with Bebe than Wendy, so I did not have to see much of her at luncheons.

Having been raised in Edinburgh as the son of a very important Scottish peer, Craig spoke with an infuriating lilt to his nasal, lifeless voice that often brought me close to slamming a fist into his mouth. I am sure the fact that he had only ever nasty things to say was no help in this regard. He was also very active in the House of Lords, and in fact held a prominent position I could not name, such as I did not follow politics except in the Guardian. He tossed around casual threats like change in his pocket and often bragged of the summers he spent as a guest at Balmoral. Often I had wondered what Token saw in Craig, to the effect that they were so close. I had to assume it was the binding of some shared experience I was not privy to.

Craig, being horrible, was not bothered to say hello to Kyle and me. But Token greeted us warmly: "Evening, Stanley." He nodded his head in my direction, then Kyle's. "…Kyle."

"Hello Token," Kyle said, wary. "Been a while. Craig. _Clyde_. Er — I'm sorry, I don't know your name—"

"It's _Tweek_," Craig barked; Tweek was hanging off Craig's arm as if it were a life preserver. His eyes were heavy-lidded and he seemed socially anxious. "And you'll address me as your _better_, Broflovski."

"_Apologies_, your grace," I sneered. "As always it is a delight to see you. Truly I could not have asked for a lovelier occurrence this evening. What brings some of our _betters_ out to a lowly gay nightclub?"

"This is ridiculous," Token muttered.

"Clyde wants a word with you, Broflovski," Craig said, as if he were dictating.

At this point Kyle felt indignant enough to drop my arm and cross his. "Well, I haven't got a thing to say to him!" he cried. "I only have adult conversations with adults, thank you."

"You threw a shoe at my face!" Clyde finally deigned to interject. "And six stitches, I needed! Six! What sort of depraved _woman_ throws a shoe at somebody?"

"What kind of _man_ can't be bothered to treat his sex partners to a few minutes of civility?"

Clyde gasped, horrified. "You call throwing a shoe _civility_?"

"Oh, this is indecency," Craig drawled. "I don't want to hear it. Clyde, take your dramatics elsewhere."

"Not if he's going to chuck another shoe at me!"

"He _won't_." Craig's glare was boring down on Kyle as he said this. "Or who knows what."

"Who knows?" Tweek yelped. "Who knows _what_? Who is knowing what?"

"Oh, my dear." With a deft hand, Craig stroked the boy's shoulder — well, _boy_ was, again, a possible misnomer. Even with deep, dark rings around his eyes and the barest hint of a day's worth of stubble, he seemed young. Not youthful, but young. Green. Nervy. His constant trembling may have been a serious drug problem, or perhaps just some kind of anxiety manifesting itself. It wasn't really my concern. He may have been as young as 22 or as old as 30. It was difficult to tell.

So I looked to Kyle and asked him what he wanted to do.

He sighed. "I fear this night is ruined. Well, come on, Clyde. Let's talk."

"I expect there'll be a distinct deficit of any sort of _shoes_," Clyde said.

"Didn't know you were a foot man," Kyle replied.

"I'm not any kind of man!" Clyde's cheeks turned pink, and he covered his mouth. "Well, you know, that's not what I mean."

They went off together, and my initial instinct was to follow. But then Craig snapped his fingers at me and I lurched back around, realizing perhaps I was now going to hear things second-hand from Kyle.

"Um." I shrugged at Craig; Token was nodding at me encouragingly, likely reading the discomfort written on my face. "So what brings you all out here tonight?" I asked.

"Moral support, I suppose," Token answered.

"Clyde is just _inept_," Craig offered. "I told him to press charges, or better, go to the press. Can't you see the headlines screaming about it? I can. _Labour MP's Son Attacks Civil Servant with Shoe_. That's what I would want to read on the Tube. That is, if I ever set foot on public transportation. But _Token_ insisted we do it this way. Or rather, that Clyde do it this way. But Clyde is scarred for life and needs his hand held like a child. I swear, I'll forever rue the day I gave that man a job."

"Well," I said, feeling quite awkward. "I'm … sure he's good at it, you know."

"Not particularly." Craig sniffed. "But that's the plutocracy for you. The establishment does have a way of running things, don't we? And then nefarious little Liberals attempt to sneak in and tear it all to shreds, don't they?"

"Oh, yes," the boy agreed, nodding vigorously. "Yes, Craig, of course."

Token rolled his eyes and sighed. I could see he felt stifled, trapped between two camps.

Not feeling up to tracking down Eric and his lot, I felt I should make an attempt at casual conversation with Token, trying my best to ignore Craig entirely. "So," I began casually enough, "how is Wendy?"

"Oh," he said, brightening. "She was out to dinner with the Lord and Lady Stevens this evening, and before that at a matinee of _Death in Venice_, which I suppose Bebe and Jason hadn't seen yet. Initially she'd produced four tickets and I told her there was no chance I would allow myself to be subjected to that opera a _third _time. So that is where she is, Stanley — or rather, what she's done this evening. I suppose she's home now."

"She sent me to _Death in Venice_ as well."

"Yes." Token nodded. "I read your review. Scandalous. She was so displeased you hated it."

"I hardly _hated_ it."

"Well, she's convinced it is _essential_ viewing this season."

"Yes, of course," Craig agreed, deciding this was a fit place to enter the conversation. "I am taking the children next weekend, actually. Annie is aghast; she thinks it'll ruin them. It's mediocre Britten, and she is such a snob. But I deeply feel if they don't begin with English opera, they'll never develop a taste for foreign — and I'll not tolerate my children growing up like that."

This entire comment caught me off-guard, and I was feeling quarrelsome enough to prompt Craig with, "Oh, Craig, how is Her Grace? I hadn't realized you were on speaking terms."

As predicted, this jostled him: "_My wife_ is just fine, thank you."

"How are the children taking it?"

Token sighed. "Oh, Stanley. Don't start."

"Oh, but I'm curious."

"Well, it's hardly your business, Marsh," Craig snapped. "My family's none of your concern."

"Oh, well — I suppose it's not." I turned to the boy. "And you — how did you come to meet His Grace? How long have you known each other? And your name — it's rather odd, isn't it? Is that something of a pet name?"

"It's — _ugh_." He shuddered dramatically. "It's my dad's name."

"Your father is also named Tweek," I said, not really asking.

"No, Stanley," Token said calmly. "It's Richard, Richard Tweak."

"Richard Tweak? You mean, the coffee magnate?"

Token nodded. "Certainly."

"It's a pun," Tweek explained. "My name and — _oh_! — I seem to be jittery."

"You're wonderful." Craig sounded so indulgent, as speaking to a beloved pet. He kissed Tweek on the lips — by far the most affection I had ever been witness to out of Craig Tucker — but just for the briefest moment. "We needn't worry about him."

Tweek just sighed and fell into Craig's arms.

I was beginning to tire of this. I loved Token dearly, and was always going to be fond of him, but the presence of Craig and his boy was so overwhelming I wanted to bolt from the scene.

"So, this has been fascinating," I said, intending to take my leave. "When Kyle comes back please tell him—"

Craig rolled his eyes. "I think you're about to have a chance to tell him yourself."

Sure enough, this was when Clyde and Kyle returned, the former shouting after the latter so loudly that he should have been quite embarrassed: "If you breathe so much as a single word of this to _anyone_ I'll have your mother unseated so fast you wish you'd never met me!"

"I already wish I'd never met you! Leave me alone, Clyde! You're miserable and I'll have nothing to do with you!"

"Craig was right about you when he said you are a self-involved cow!"

"Oh, he said that?" Kyle stopped stalking toward us and spun around to address Clyde: "Fucking bloody wonderful that you're discussing me with _Craig_, of all people, Donovan. Really fantastic."

Now they were having this shouting match about 10 feet away. "Oh, come off it! Like you and Stanley haven't spent countless hours abusing _me_ and badmouthing _me_ and conceiving of all sorts of ways in which I'm an inferior being and how dare I fail to appreciate the magic of copulating with your divine golden rectum!"

Kyle clutched his behind in both hands, blushing, and looking scandalized. "Why do you think that's what we do?"

"Because I've known both of you for 20 years! And you've both always been abhorrent bitches! Why do you think no one wants to stay with you for more than a month or so? You're a talky little shrew! You're so needy. It's like dating a debutante! And lord knows I've dated my fair share of debutantes so I _know_. Why'd you even want me to fuck you in the first place?"

"I _let_ you fuck me because I was so miserable, Clyde, that I would have let a horse fuck me if it had stumbled by me at the time."

"Then why'd you keep coming back?"

"Because it was more or less exactly like being fucked by a horse and I was lonely and lascivious and you were right there!"

"How is getting fucked by me like being fucked by a horse?"

"Have you looked at that thing in your pants, dear? It's roughly the size of someone's forearm. If only the man it was attached to didn't make me sick to my stomach! If only you'd deigned to actually speak to me after you came in my arse instead of rolling over and snoring with your mouth open like a dog."

"Kyle…" Clyde made a grab for Kyle's hand.

Kyle wrenched it away. "Don't touch me!"

Clyde's face went red and he bellowed, "You're a selfish, shallow, greedy little poof! No one loves you and no one is ever going to love you and you're lucky you got your nose slapped off or you'd be too repellently ugly to fuck!"

"People love me, Clyde." Kyle sniffed. "Hiding in the closet for 20 years has gotten you what, exactly? I may not be perfect but at least I'm not going to die knowing I never lived the life I needed to. Come on, Stanley." He lurched backward and somehow grabbed my forearm.

I wasn't sure if it was appropriate to speak. "It'll be all right, Clyde," I said slowly.

"Stanley!" Kyle barked.

"Sure." Clyde rolled his eyes. "Enjoy him or whatever."

XXX

In the corridor behind the loo, on the way to the back, we collapsed against the cinderblock wall and kissed, furious, hardly pausing to breathe. Kyle's tongue was upon mine, our teeth colliding so haphazardly that I wasn't entirely certain they wouldn't shatter. My mouth felt overtired, on auto-pilot, guilelessly working into his on instinct. It felt brilliant; it felt romantic. The erection folded up in my briefs wanted out, and Kyle angled his into mine, clutching my cheeks and refusing to let go. The moment felt insane.

We had to pause to catch our breaths, to choke on ragged gasps of air and feel our lips stinging and look at one another in the sick bluish light of the hallway, the scents of sex and all of its byproducts, moistness and froth and perspiration, lingering around us. His hair, long enough to grasp but too short as yet to style, wilted in the humidity; I was sure I looked horrible, but I didn't care.

"My god," he hissed, attacking my cock through my trousers, groping. "Feel this thing." He kissed my neck. We had fucked already twice that day, once upon waking in a chair at my flat and a second, more tempered time after putting away the groceries, Kyle's feet on his own headboard and calves across my shoulders. It did not occur to me that any certain number of times was too many to copulate in a day, but generally after coming inside of some unparticular stranger I lost interest and went home. Not so with Kyle; it was some 28 hours after we'd convened at his parents' and I did not want to let him out of my sight.

"It's you," I whispered to him, unsure of whether I'd rather grope his arse or lose my fingers in his hair, letting myself remember what it was like when it was longer, whipped into a frenzy and effort-laden, teased like egg whites into stiff auburn peaks. I settled for one hand in each place, grateful I had two as he bit the skin below my jawbone, doubtlessly leaving trails of bruising evidence. "You make me so hard. It's all I can do not to force you against the wall and fuck you again."

"I wish you would."

"Maybe I shall." My neck felt raw, his lips wet against my flesh.

"Well, do it already."

I unbuttoned his jeans, and we kissed.

"Hurry," he panted into my mouth.

A man brushed past us, glancing behind his shoulder at Kyle's behind on his way into the loo.

Kyle put his arms around my neck. "When men look at me like that I have one of two reactions," he said. I palmed the front of his damp briefs inside of his open fly. "Intrigued, or violated."

I swallowed down some jealousy. "Which now?"

"Mmm, I don't know." He grabbed my wrist, and redirected my hand under the elastic. "It's flattering."

"Mmmm."

"But it's so _objectifying_." My hand tightened inside of his briefs. "Do that again."

"Ask me. _Beg_ me."

"It _hurts_," he whined. "I feel so _empty_. It smells like fucking come and sweat and piss back here and I think it's only fair you fuck me like a little whore against a wall because you _promised_ me you would and I _want you_ so bad, I've had you twice today Stanley but I'm _greedy_, I damn well want more. And my dick is so fucking hard, too. Do you feel it?"

"Mhmm."

"You're going to take care of me, won't you?"

"Yeah."

"Put your fat cock in my arse and fuck me like a greedy little slut?"

All I could do in response was groan, but I heard someone say, "Oh my god"; not an unusual thing to be uttered during sex, but it wasn't Kyle saying it, so I turned my head past his for a moment to see who was there, only to spy Token.

"I'm so sorry," he said. His arms were crossed and his jaw was set. "I hadn't any idea."

"Hello, Token," Kyle said, forcing his erection back into his pants, cheeks red. "Long time no see."

"Stanley, Kyle, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to interrupt."

"Well, how could you know?" I asked.

"It's all right, it's fine," Kyle murmured. He refastened a button near the bottom of his shirt. "It isn't as if we haven't done it twice today already."

"Twice?" Token blinked. "I'm so sorry, I really didn't know — I didn't realize — I was just coming back here to apologize — Clyde, you know, and Craig, they don't — they didn't—"

"Like hell they didn't!" Kyle snapped, regaining his composure quite readily. "Tell your friend Clyde Donovan that he's got no peerage, no wit, no charm, no money, he lives with his parents, and I hope he gives his next girlfriend Chlamydia and her ovaries harden and fall out of her twat."

Token was unable to resist laughing. "I'll be certain to tell him."

"And Craig can go straight to hell," Kyle continued, without cracking a smile. "_He_ is more damaging to Britain than whatever 'liberal agenda' he rails on, censorship bills be damned. I'll not have my name or my family's name dragged through the mud on account of Clyde wishing to stick his fingers in his ears and pretend it didn't happen like it's 1965. I already suffered that life once and I'll never have it again. Tell them both to keep their bloody money and if Clyde will be exposed it's not on my account. He'll find himself mired in far more _shit_ than I could dream to rain down upon him soon enough."

As Kyle was speaking, the smile fell from Token's face. "Those are strong words," he said. "As he is my friend, I think I should advice you that, actually, I think this is simply his way of making peace with you. He is quite sweet on you — or was, anyhow, before the whole thing with the shoe."

"I'd throw any number of shoes at Clyde for the way he made me feel, like a dirty secret or a nightmare or a whore. I'm none of those things."

"I understand." Token nodded.

"No one deserves to feel that way. And I'll not be complicit in someone, some _man_ thinking I'll be a willing accomplice in his double life. It is _intolerable_."

Token gaped. "…I'll take that under advisement."

Kyle rolled his eyes. "Will you, now?"

"Of course," Token said coolly. 'But it seems there may more than a single reason for Clyde's rejection this evening. Frankly, though, I'm in no way shocked. It's hardly the first time poor Clyde's got his heart broken in one of your grasps."

"I don't know what you're talking about," Kyle said.

"At Oxford. Clyde was hung up on Miss Marjorine Faithfull. Sadly, she was taken."

"Well, I certainly think we never any had any idea about _that_," I said.

"Of course you didn't. Neither of you paid any attention to any of us until I took a fancy to you." He pointed at me.

"That's not true! Token, you all treated us all like lepers."

"I admit, we may have done. But what did you want me to do? It was illegal. As I do not need to remind you. And anyway, I'll not fight with both of you over queer politics."

"I have nothing to do with politics," I said.

"But he does." Token pointed at Kyle.

"Me?" Kyle asked. "What have I got to do with politics?"

"No, not you-you," Token specified. "Your mother."

"Oh, well. What about her?"

"Craig is livid. He wants her _out_."

"Well, _that_ is ridiculous," I said, somewhat aware that the thin slime of Kyle's arousal was drying, webbed between my fingers. "Sheila's not even _that_ liberal."

"No, but she's _loud_. It's all he goes on about. Craig, that is. He's vehemently anti-welfare, you know. You know _me_, Stanley. I lean left, of course, but I don't yet have a seat. No one really cares what I think. But if I were you, I'd be careful. Mrs. Broflovski's ideas on censorship are unappealing to everyone — too stringent for Liberals and too lenient for the Tories. Craig covets a Conservative sweep in the next general election, and I believe he means to contrive some way to forestall passing any of your mother's legislation so she'll be vulnerable."

"Well," Kyle scoffed, "it's perfectly absurd that a man who left his wife and five children for a 20-year-old with a _drug habit_ would think _my mother_ might be vulnerable."

"Well, you forget — Craig's seat is his father's legacy. He can do whatever he likes and they can't rip it from his hands. He'll be ensconced in the Upper House until he dies. Your mother is an American-born Jewish housewife who sounds like a film noir character every time she opens her mouth."

Kyle sighed. "This is pointless! Thank you for the veiled threats, Token. You can run back to Clyde and Craig, now, and tell them we're sufficiently frightened."

"As it happens, they've left. I'm not trying to frighten you!" Token protested. "I'm your friend!"

"No, you're theirs."

"I'm not _anyone's_. Stanley, you know this is ridiculous. I'm not vindictive."

"This conversation _is_ ridiculous," I replied. Something about being caught between Kyle and Token made me miserable. The creeping urge to flee Camp entirely and run straight home settled in. "I came here to have a night out, not get caught between multiple alternating accusations."

"Well, he did _throw a shoe_," Token reminded me. "That much I think we are all clear on."

"Stop bringing it up!" Kyle cried. "Token, you're a human being, aren't you? You understand where I am coming from, I expect. Or then again, maybe you don't. You're married. Craig is married. Clyde aims to be. All I have are these fleeting little relationships. I don't understand how you men can be so detached! I can't possibly be expected to feign an English resolve every moment of my life."

"You _don't_ understand." Token shook his head. "Kyle, your mother is an American."

"Oh, I hadn't noticed," Kyle snapped. "That hasn't got anything to do with it."

"I believe it does. Clyde and Craig are not _feigning_ resolve. They are both programmed to act as though they feel nothing. As am I. As is Stanley. As are you, I suppose, but even at university it was apparent you expect everyone to court you like a teenage girl in suburban Connecticut. At least, I _think_ I mean Connecticut. But I think because your mother is an immigrant she's imparted on you some kind of need to express these feelings that the rest of us just suppress.

"From the first time I met you, in a tutorial on 18th-century _Romance_ literature, it was apparent you were not like the rest of us. You read those Blake poems aloud in a trembling voice that betrayed your ability to empathize with little girls lost and so on. I mean, _hell_, you were wearing rouge. So forgive me if the three of us — or four, rather, including James — were a bit put off by you. Because it wasn't masculine sexuality you exuded — we were all used to that, anyway, after years at Eton. It was just that you were so defiantly _femme_. In opposition to, say, Butters, who was blatant enough to understand."

Token cleared his throat before continuing: "Anyhow, my friends did leave, and rather than stay here and be maligned I think I shall go home and make love to my wife. But I wish you both the best of luck. Good night, Stanley. Kyle." He nodded at both of us as he left, and I think he seemed somewhat sad. He walked out with his hands at his sides, glancing at no one. I watched his behind as he left, until he slipped behind a bar, and we lost track of him in the narrow alley of sight the back hallway provided.

For a moment I missed him. After Token and I split up, just before graduation, I had been a wreck — every smiling man on the street, regardless of race, reminded me of him. I spent a week holding myself on the floor of my room, nursing tumblers of rye and listening to gospel LPs Wendy had lent me for their operatic enthusiasm. It was pathetic that the person I turned to for help getting over my ex-boyfriend was his new fiancée, but one day I woke up and didn't want to cry, feeling much better about myself. Kyle agreed, finally, that we should both move to London, and to share a flat in Chelsea. We lived there just two years, but I loved that flat.

"How'd I do?" Kyle asked, bringing my attention back to him and away from reminiscence.

"Darling, that was amazing. You just got more out of Token that I have managed in two decades."

Kyle shrugged. "The ironic thing is, I am not even interested. Threatening me with conspiracies against my mother? Defending Clyde for being an ass? Delusions of bisexuality — he thinks he is going to bed a _woman_? Conrad may have a point, after all — the Nile tends to flow through Africa, if I recall."

"Token's never been to Africa proper," I corrected. "Just Alexandria and Marrakesh."

"It's just the same."

"And generally, your wordplay is cleverer than a _the Nile _crack. I may be disappointed."

He grabbed my by the belt loops and leaned in. "You won't be disappointed later. Come on." He let go. "Let's go find Eric and finagle some coke out of him."

XXX

After inhaling what seemed like a handful, Kyle wanted to dance. It was all part of a typical Saturday night out: champagne, cocaine, lose all inhibitions, dance madly up against anyone who was standing next to him, and be sick in the loo. Go home with whomever he expected to fuck him that evening, and spend Sunday recovering. Report to the Bucky after work on Monday with tales of heartbreak. I was anxious to see how this would play out between us. I was too overwhelmed to dance, and instead I took him to the bar for a drink. We had not seen Miss B all night, and Eric and Kenny were involved in their own dramatic display of affection — that is, they were snogging noisily, breathing each other in with the sort of urgency I imagine could only be fueled by drugs and the thrill of public spaces.

So we went to get a drink, and Kyle was overly affectionate, stroking my hair and nuzzling against my shoulders. "I _really_ do like looking at you," he kept slurring. "You're so _very_ easy to look at."

"You're not so bad yourself."

"Do you know all the times I've had some other man's cock inside me, thinking it would be best if it were you?" He was slurring this into my ear.

"That's flattering," I said, wrapping one arm around his waist so I could maintain a firm grasp on my drink with my free hand. I sort of wished he could save these things for later, for some private bedroom moment. I hated the idea of doing _this_ at Camp.

"And you know that awful phone I bought you, that one time, that you got me that huge dildo at the same time?"

I cringed; when Kyle's syntax was all askew, he was really quite gone — not even wired anymore, seeming to defy logic. "Of course."

"Well, do you know I would read your fabulous little pornography books and read the scenes over and over again, with that fat old dildo stuck up inside of me so deep I liked to pretend it was you? I did that, you know. I do it all the time. I do it last week, you know, like maybe four times."

Well, that thought was scintillating enough to make my pants tighter.

"Good god, darling." I kissed him on the cheek. "You're _really_ trashed."

"Don't care," he slurred back. "Doesn't matter. You'll keep me safe."

"Yeah." I kissed him again. Then he turned toward me and we were kissing. The pulse of some insignificant song was throbbing in the background, and we were managing to snog along to it in some bizarre way. I thought the lyrics were something like nonsense words, _too rah loo rah too rah loo rah_, but then Kyle's tongue jabbed into mine and I forgot about it.

This was where we were and what we were doing when Butters reappeared, hair (what little he had left of it) all mussed and the top three buttons on his shirt undone, big purpling marks all up and down his throat. "Oh!" He signaled to the bartender, and then turned back to us. "So this is where you've been!"

"Yeah," I said, pushing Kyle off of my mouth. He made some kind of protest whimper, which was cute, but I was too sober to really indulge it. "It looks like you've been busy."

A grin blossomed across his face. "A bit, yes."

I raised my eyebrows.

Butters' face pinkened. He turned around and shouted, "It's okay! They won't bite!" and from the throng of dancing patrons around the bar, a short, bespectacled ginger-haired man sauntered over. "See, they're very nice. What did I tell you? Boys, this is Douglas."

Douglas took this as a cue to extend his hand. I took it.

Butters introduced us as, "Stanley Marsh. And companion, Kyle Broflovski."

"Hiiiiii," Kyle slurred. "Those are big glasses you have." This man, Douglas, blushed at that.

"These are very old friends of mine," Butters continued. "Very old, very dear friends. I mean, not old — I mean, I've known them since university — I mean, that doesn't really explain—"

Douglas chuckled. "I do understand."

"So what do you do?" Kyle asked, too wasted to be self-conscious.

"Oh, I find myself in a constant state of general disarray," he said. "And I like maths."

"Well, from what he explained before — um, _you know _— Douglas just took a degree from LSE—"

"Yes, a D. Phil in non-linear time series, actually."

"—isn't that impressive?" Butters gushed. Then he shook his head as the bartender reappeared to hand him a drink. (I didn't think it was very impressive.)

"I'll get it," Douglas offered. He fished a fiver out and tendered it.

"So, where have you two been? And how did it go with Clyde and that group?"

"Just awful," Kyle groaned. "He is such a beast, such a dreary little fuck."

"Who is Clyde?" Douglas asked.

"A man we studied with at Oxford," Butters answered. "You know, he's not really important. But, are you all right?"

"Oh, I'm fine," Kyle replied. "Properly anesthetized and all that. Courtesy of Eric, at cost. I can still talk that fat bastard into anything. Of course, he's also distracted by groping copious amounts of underage boy arse. We had a talk with Token as well, actually. Did you know Clyde apparently had a crush on you at university?"

"Ah, no." Now Butters was really blushing furiously. "I didn't really, er, talk to him, you know—"

"Well, it just figures that he would try to ease into gay sex like that." Kyle laughed, tipping his head back with a kind of unchained chemical-related gaiety. "Going after a drag queen to mitig — mitiage — _mitigate_ the thing, can't do it with a real boy I suppose, I mean it was the 1960s but _really_."

I saw Butters' face fall.

Douglas raised an eyebrow. "Interesting," he muttered. "That's … unexpected."

"I can explain—"

"It's fine, I don't—I'm not—"

Kyle was smirking, arms crossed, very satisfied with the careless cruelty he'd just thrown in Butters' face. "Something about being blatant enough to understand, I guess, which it is, you know, I mean then that was like what people thought, you know, it just _was_…" He trailed off, well enough since he wasn't even saying anything, just trying to dig himself out of a very deep hole that had made both Butters and his prospective conquest very uncomfortable.

It was about this time that I realized I was really exhausted. Sick of being a passive bystander in this conversation, I said, "Well, this was a strange night. Boys — please excuse us."

"So very nice to meet you." Douglas extended a small hand, which I grasped again with tentative reserve. We shook slowly.

"Oh, dear, ah — I'll see you," Butters added, patting me on the back. "Next weekend, I suppose. Kyle, I'll call you."

"Sure, that's great, do call me." Kyle made a phoning gesture with his pinky and thumb, holding it against his ear. "I wouldn't fuck on the first date, though, Miss B, I know it's been a while but they never take you seriously when I do that."

"Miss B?" Douglas was gaping now. "You said your name was Leopold."

"It is." Butters sighed, hunching his shoulders.

I felt bad abandoning them like that, but it was time to get out of Camp. I glanced back at our table on the way out, but Kenny and Eric had disappeared. Figuring this entire situation a bust, I corralled Kyle outside; he clung to me the whole time, trying to bite into my shoulder.

Hailing a cab was easy enough. I knew I had about 35 pounds, which was more than suitable to get back to Kyle's — and mine, if necessary, on the chance that I could not get out of his apartment before the Underground stopped running. All throughout the ride back to Notting Hill Gate he tried to hump me in the backseat of the taxi, babbling all sorts of wavering half-developed come-ons in my ear. I could resist this onslaught, but just barely, steeling myself against his allure with the knowledge that he was high and not thinking rational thoughts. It was rather unromantic.

I got him upstairs in the lift and managed to wrangle his key from his pocket.

"Oh," he breathed, grabbing my wrist as I slipped it out of his trousers. "You _do_ want it, don't you?"

"Just your keys," I said, leading him up to his door. "You're going to bed."

"Yes, exactly."

"No, Kyle. Not with me."

"But why?"

How to explain to him how I felt? It had been a long day, the end of a longer week, and I was still half-certain that when he woke up the next day he would be horrified to realize that what we'd been doing was a tragic mistake, a fatal tonic of sympathy and lust. Every sense in my arsenal felt dulled, and I couldn't imagine he was faring much better with rampant neurotransmitters bouncing around inside his head. I just knew he would be a lousy lay; you don't live through the countercultural revolution in central London without realizing that people on drugs are too aimless to thrust in the right direction. Yet they will remember they were doing it correctly, and gloat about it later, which was annoying.

About halfway to Kyle's bedroom, having succeeded in getting him to kick off his loafers, I realized that this rationalization was all in my head, and that I was essentially trying to compensate for being too tired to will myself to do it. Generally, though, Kyle had been on the receiving end of sex against his will more often than anyone else I knew, and the thought occurred to me that depriving him of the sober ability to decide for himself would have been criminal. Were we both drunk, I would have done it in a heartbeat, without pausing to think. But the notion of taking advantage of him like this threatened to break my heart.

"I'm very tired," I said, which was also true. We were in his bed now, and I was admiring the discolored bruises on his neck that were beginning to show through smudged concealer.

"You don't want to fuck me," he replied, which was so far from the truth in general.

"Well, not right now, no, but let's do it a lot some other time, okay?"

"Why?"

"Because it's been a really long day and a lot happened and I'm tired."

"But _why_?"

We were both lying on our sides, but he was grasping me from behind, so that I was looking away from him. It felt nice to be held, as I hadn't been for some time, but I _was_ tried and hearing him whine was disconcerting. So I sat up, taking his hand. "I reckon you're far too inebriated to understand this right now, darling, but I don't consider sex to be a kind of validation. I promise you, if you let me fall asleep now I will fuck you as often and as thoroughly as you like for the rest of our lives."

Kyle didn't say anything at first. He was lying on his back, staring up at me with wide, hyper-alert eyes, still in most of what he'd put on to go out that night. "I want everyone to know," he said. "It's not fitting to make things be so clanest — clandestine."

"I have to sleep." I lay back down, facing him this time. "Please let me sleep." I shut my eyes, or rather, they shut themselves, as I began to realize I could not stay awake much longer.

"Oh, okay."

The last thing I was conscious of was Kyle climbing over me, straddling me again from behind.

Waking at about 8 a.m. to the sound of discordant birds flocking away from the park, the sun stung my eyes and I forced myself up, shocked to find that I'd slept for hours in Kyle's bed. He was next to me still, sleeping now, mouth open and hands splayed, having rolled over in the night. It occurred to me he may have been up to vomit or something but I myself felt relatively decent, if curiously lonely.

In the kitchen I had a glass of water and found a pad of paper with the name of Kyle's agency emblazoned at the top. Fishing a pen from one of the drawers, I scrawled a message: _Lovely night. Hope you got enough sleep. Went home to shower, for fresh pants. See you Bucky Monday night? Fondly S.M._ I debated with myself for a moment over whether to make this sound more personal or more romantic or to curtail any kind of effusion and let him make the next move. I stared at my writing for a while, hoping he could read it, wishing I had a typewriter so I would look polished rather than barbaric, Edwardian rather than quickly jotted with a creaky biro. But after a few moments of self-doubt I told myself that if Kyle loved me I would see him the next day, and that I really needed my toothbrush. I left this note on the vanity where I knew he would find it and kissed him briefly so that he would not stir. Then I went home, hopping on the Circle Line, heading for Farringdon.

XXX

"Hi."

I glanced up from an empty whisky glass, crunching a lingering piece of ice between my very-back molars. It was typical of Kyle to be late on Monday nights — well, always, really. This time, however, rather than annoyed, I was sick with worry; he may have been avoiding me, or testing me, or simply even more nonchalant about meeting me on time, after what had been a very good but peculiar weekend. Or perhaps he was trying to banish the past three days by acting typical. All these possibilities terrified me.

But here he was, and I was so relieved to see him that I grinned madly and said, "Hello, darling," and stood up to embrace him.

He kissed me on the lips; it was chaste but he was smiling, too. "Sorry I'm late! Oh, I'm so relieved — held up at the office, I think, I don't even know where the time goes. But I'm … I thought you weren't even going to be here!"

"Why wouldn't I be?" I asked, knowing quite well that I was relieved, too.

"Oh." He shrugged. "I don't know. Take my coat?" He handed me a sport jacket, a sort of brocade houndstooth that looked fairly silly but I was touched to see that he was trying to impress me.

"Nice coat," I said.

Blushing, he stammered, "Oh, you know, it's just some _thing._"

"Okay. Do you want a drink?"

"Dying for one."

Having finally cashed my checks that morning I was able to buy him a cider and myself a can of Tetley — the taste of it was pedestrian, but it reminded me of Friday night in his parents' garden, the stench of lamp gas and acrid fertilizer nourishing flora as it decomposed. Carrying my purchase back to the table, I felt urbane and sophisticated and overall very glad. There was no one in the bar but Kyle, myself, and the bartender. The cook may have been in the kitchen, but the last thing I felt was hungry, so it didn't matter to me. I'd stopped by the Bucky the previous evening and flirted with as many men as I pleased, denying all of them after a drink. It had felt invigorating, and I kept hoping Kyle would be there, too, but he hadn't been. The calm of Monday late afternoon felt almost sane compared to Sunday night.

"What did you do last night?" I asked him.

"Oh, I spent all day with Ike, actually. Well, no, I suppose _all day_ is something of an exaggeration — I slept until noon, which was impressive considering I cannot remember when I went to bed and to be honest, I feel I'm _still_ high on cocaine from two nights ago. Are you experiencing that?"

"No, but then, I didn't have any."

"Oh, curious. Well, anyway, Ike called and woke me, and we had lunch around Earl's Court — some Turkish restaurant. Very sloppy, you know, the food was very saucy and I felt like a peasant. But, so cheap! I think we both ate for under a tenner which is impressive. Yes? Ike loves that sort of thing. I don't know, that boy — he always likes slumming it. Then he caught a 7 p.m. train. I went with him to Euston and said goodbye and — and, well, I think I slept some more. Perfectly innocent day, really. We just — just talked. Anyway…" Kyle trailed off, and pulled something — a folded-up piece of heavy cream-colored stationery — from his waistcoat pocket. "This is for you."

"What is it?" I asked.

"I don't know! I assumed it was confidential. _Actually_." Kyle leaned in, nearly knocking over his cider (but just missing it), and whispered to me, "I told him about — well, you know, _you_. I assume it's some piece of fraternal guardianship. Very exciting. He's never actively acknowledged a relationship of mine before."

As I unfolded the paper, I thought to myself that it was nice to know that Kyle felt we were in a relationship. I had also never received a note from Ike before; generally he found me unworthy of address. Nevertheless, he had written me one now, and it read:

_To Stanley,_

_Kyle and I have been speaking today — rather he is talking my ear off — about all matters of disinterest. Of curious note to me is this ex-lover of yours who has passed away, and I feel compelled to write you while he is in the restroom. First and foremost, my condolences. Secondly, I thought you should be aware that the term Kyle used to describe the man's fatal illness, "an immunodeficiency," has caught my attention. (As virtually nothing else he has said today has.) I have been reading medical literature from various American centers for research on morbidity and mortality, and this brings to mind what a recent issue of _

Here I stopped reading, folded the paper back up, and stuck it in my pocket.

"Well?" Kyle asked. "What's it say?"

"Nothing, really," I confessed. To be honest, I was somewhat disappointed. I suppose it was nice enough that the boy had some manners — but then again, he was the younger son of an MP, so he had to have picked up some social graces along the way. That said, why Ike felt I would be interested in his musings on medicine was beyond me. Surely he didn't expect me to reply with several paragraphs of gay pornography, which he would probably have found just as absurd.

"Is it about me?"

I rolled my eyes. "Kyle, not everything is about you."

He pouted. "Thanks. Cheers, that's splendid."

"No, I mean — it's a letter of condolence. About Gary. Why are you discussing that with Ike?"

"Why, am I forbidden to have a conversation about it? I have to engage him about _something_! He doesn't want to hear about anything being put inside _anyone's_ arse and I certainly don't need to hear another word about bloody Flora. So we traded some shoptalk, that's all. And, well, Ike did _know_ Gary. That note didn't indicate what killed him, did it? Gary, I mean. Ike was very curious."

"No," I repeated. "Kyle, look. That part of my life is over. I don't want to talk about it anymore."

"Oh."

For a few minutes we sat sipping our drinks, looking at one another but not quite saying anything. Two men came into the bar, followed by a few stray tourists, and then another pair of men — these with bulging upper arms and sheath-tight vests tucked into tight leather pants. I shuddered. Summer was ending, but it was far too humid still for something as outré as leather pants. Aside from the fact that one was blond and one bald, they were impossible to tell apart. At the bar, they shared a brief little kiss and one of them laughed. They couldn't have been much younger than I, and yet I felt generations away from that entire scene.

"Staring at those blokes?" Kyle asked me.

"Oh. Er, yes." No sense in hiding it.

"Like that?"

I shook my head. "Not particularly. Why?"

"Oh, just wondering. Anyway." He coughed into his hand to make some kind of point, or draw the conversation back to more familiar territory. "So, here is what I am thinking: Let's both of us finish our drinks, right? Then we can take a cab back to my place and tear each other's clothing off and fuck on the living room floor like complete animals. I'll make you a nice dinner — I have some smoked salmon I can do something with, perhaps make a salad. Regrettably I do think Eric ate all the pasties and I didn't bring anything home from the restaurant yesterday. We can eat on the balcony with Radio 4 in the background, though, and then fuck a second time. I'm _famished_. So can we do that?"

"Sure, if you like that."

"Sweetheart, _I love it_."

And so did I.

* * *

End Part I.

All right, here we are at the halfway marker. Thank you for sticking with me! I abandon nothing.


	6. Chapter 6

For years, Wendy had been telling me that Kyle loved misery, and wanted to stay miserable until he died. To this day I do not understand her motivations for repeating this misunderstanding so often and with such certainty.

There were years of my young adulthood when I was convinced that Wendy might have been in love with me — but gradually, it became clear that Wendy had never been properly _in love_ with anyone. She felt fondness for me akin to something one might feel for a twin brother, I suppose, and lust was not part of the equation. She found me attractive and liked to think of me coupling with other good-looking men — so long as they weren't her husband — but in time I learned that this did not mean that she was in love with me.

So if not for jealousy, I didn't quite know why she was so fixated on her idea that Kyle was bound to be joyless. He wasn't. Kyle and I took joy from joylessness itself — others', on the whole, although there is a certain element of camping that delights in misfortune worldwide. England, in a way, revels in its own absurdity, an empire of nothing ruled by an empress of even less. There is much to love and respect about Great Britain — but for every Oxford there is a Stonehenge, ancient and obscure beyond that which is necessary. For every Waugh, a Coward; for every Handel, a Britten.

Kyle and I loved all of these things; in particular we loved them together. Perhaps this is why I loved Waugh so much — for every Charles Ryder, there is a Sebastian Flyte. It suited me to reassure myself that in Kyle's company, the sacred and the profane were at last joined. He was sophisticated and graceful, affluent and particular. Kyle worked hard, harder than I had ever worked in my life, straining his eyes against the pages and pages of advert copy he would comb through on a daily basis. His job entailed meeting with clients, selling both himself and his agency writ large. It occurred to me that Kyle himself was a product: crisp waistcoat, big smile, immaculate nails, impressive hair. He spoke softly, with a bit of judgment in his tone, a slight uptick at the end of each sentence as if he were phrasing it as a question.

Once I heard him say to a representative from Jaguar, "And I'm sure you must be hungry," but he toned it like a question. Soon that man was eating an egg and bacon sandwich while Kyle lectured him about disposable income, and how those who can't breed simply have more of it. By the end of the impromptu lunch, Kyle had won a 3.1 million-pound account. He'd simply used his home as an illustration of the type of customer Jaguar might attract. Me, I was a well-placed prop, being introduced as a "friend," nothing more, although it was obvious by the way Kyle said it that there was something so wrong and sad about the pathetic little word _friend_.

There was more to Kyle, though, than slick salesmanship. He had a sad, cruel, needy side. The moment he came home, the pretense of success fell away, shoulders sagging as he kicked off his shoes. There was something so carefully and deliberate in everything he did. But he did these things — working hard, commodifying himself, pronouncing soft interrogatives were there was no question intended — in an effort to achieve some kind of contentment. I think he often laughed at the misfortune of others because he so internalized his own. It may have been Quentin Crisp who wrote of longing for a great, dark man — or perhaps that had been from the film adaptation. It's so difficult to remember. Kyle empathized with views like this.

Monogamy had never been an issue for me. I liked it well enough. Whenever I actually professed to _be_ with a man, any real interest on my part in sleeping with other men fell away. Of course, I found plenty of men attractive, and I did at times feel tempted to play with the boundaries of my marriage, such as it was. But at heart I wanted to be part of a couple, and if I could be, it came easily enough. This is not to speak of all the years between Token and Gary, and Gary and Kyle, during which I took advantage of every opportunity I possibly could to fuck just about everyone I could manage. Men were everywhere in postwar Britain — straying husbands and Japanese tourists and horny bankers and tortured old peers who had only dreamed of the day I might approach them in a sauna.

But, yes, I craved single-partner companionship, and I didn't know this for certain until I was well-enough into it. I liked being me, an independent agent strolling around London mid-afternoon thinking literary thoughts to myself. At night, however, I went to Kyle, or he came to me, and we did whatever it is we had been doing for years already — just more of it, and at the end there was often sex. These were the happiest years of my life, and it was a relief to know that we were compatible after all — he wanted a husband, and I wanted a constant companion. In my entire existence I had never liked anyone so strongly as I liked him. I was certain of this.

Things were never perfect, but things rarely are. He was so submissive in bed I was often amazed. I suppose this bothered me enough to complain about it, largely to Wendy, who was seldom sympathetic. "I know the type," she once said with a shrug. "Debutantes, mostly, who tend to feel entitled to a jocular man and don't do much to return the favor."

"Kyle's nothing like that," I'd argue. "He's not, you know, aristocratic."

Wendy had no more response to my defense than, "Well, whatever. Be careful what you wish for, and so on. He likes to be done, or done _to_. That's what you wanted, right?" With the stabilizing of my sex life, Wendy had become disinterested in hearing about it.

Once, I tried to determine how many men, exactly, I had actually slept with. At school and university, the numbers were respectable — a couple of times a year with random boys who cropped up out of nowhere, and a handful of steadies. I mostly slept with English boys at Oxford; Eric that one disturbing time, the evening I met him. Craig and Clyde were never possibilities, but I had James twice before he died; all we managed to do was kiss rhythmically and thrust out of time against each other. A few boys I went out with, tried to seriously date. None of that worked out.

I once began to rattle off figures for Kyle. "Oh, you must assume once a day, at least, during the period between 1967 and 1976," I estimated. "I mean, on average. Certainly some days I slept with no one, and other days, well—"

"Enough!" Kyle had cried, covering his ears. "Can't you see I don't want to hear about it?"

Of course I could. And for that reason, it pleased me.

XXX

Around 5 p.m. on an autumn Saturday, the sun was at the perfect height in the sky to illuminate Kyle's bedroom in warm, yellow light. Splayed in front of me were his buttocks, as I tongued around and inside of his entrance, having just deposited probably no more than a large spoonful of seed therein. But he hadn't come yet, and so I was encouraging the process along as he stroked himself — clumsily, with the pressure of his stomach weighing down his wrist to the point that I could tell he was having trouble building toward a good rhythm. Withdrawing for a moment, I crept a hand in underneath his hip. "Let me," I whispered against the fleshy part of his behind.

"Mmmph." He groaned, and fidgeted, and had to lift his head away from the pillow he'd tucked into to respond. "No, dear, I'm fine; I'm fine. You're doing beautifully, really."

I pressed a kiss into the curve of his buttock where it met his thigh. "But I want you to feel good, darling."

"Oh, all right," he said, sitting up. He moved the pillow he'd been hugging off to the side. His nipples, in their abstract fleshy tone, were still hard, glowing harshly in the aftermath of my attentions. He pulled me toward him, kissing my lips with forceful intent. "You taste like ass and come," he announced after swiping my tongue with his.

"Well, who's to thank for that?"

He ran a hand through my hair carefully, not wanting to muss it, although even without seeing myself I had a hard time imagining it wasn't already fairly disastrous. "You, for coming inside of me."

"No, I think you are, for asking me to eat you."

"Well, either way." He pushed me away by the shoulders, and gestured down.

Every so often I would glance up Kyle's torso as I worked, delighting in the way he sucked at his middle and index fingers throughout the act, a detail that never failed to speak to me on some perversely sensual level. Until recently, his preference had always been to come during coitus, so his muscles would squeeze against the invading prick in an uncertain, unsteady rhythm. Lately, though, we'd been talking about holding out, orgasm depravation, whatever you'd like to call it — he'd been concentrating on delaying his climax until after mine. I knew it was my influence steering him in this direction, but I was loathe to discover that he had a difficult time achieving orgasm after I'd already pulled out. I had tried everything I could think of: hand jobs, blow jobs, offering to let him fuck me (he didn't take me up on that), siphoning my own seed out of him and feeding it back as he masturbated. Nothing was working. Kyle adored it when I ate him out as foreplay, but something about this post-coital version was wearing him down. He would climax eventually, I was certain. But after an hour of build-up, I would have been dying to come, and for him it was an effort. Sooner or later we were going to have to engage in a discussion about the long-term sustainability of Kyle's desire to teach himself to orgasm after sex, but I was reluctant to have this conversation because of the detached, clinical way we talked about it. Doing it was much more fun.

While his cock was precariously supported by my tongue, the phone began to ring, and it did not stop. With a sigh, I sat up, and wiped my lips. "Aren't you going to get that?" I asked.

Kyle took his fingers out of his mouth, and his other hand, which had been tweaking at one of his nipples, stilled. "We're in the middle of making love, Stanley," he said, shifting his hips. "Why would I get the phone?"

"It could be anyone," I said. "It could be one of your parents." While not in particular bad health, they were both in their 70s. "It could be your brother. It could be work."

He scoffed. "If it's work, they don't deserve my attention right now, because it's Saturday afternoon, the afternoon I specifically reserve for refusing to leave the bedroom." It was true; instead of going out on to brunch on Saturdays, we tended to eat buttery porridge in bed — sometimes we would split a grapefruit. It was so much nicer recovering from a night out this way; I much preferred it to a mediocre fry-up at the Bucky where you might run into someone you didn't want to see.

I shrugged, and pulled my fingers out of his arse. "I'll get it."

"Are you mad?"

I shook my head as I answered the phone, asking, "Hello, Broflovski residence, who's this?" in my shakiest voice. Kyle was glowering at me, holding his cock in both hands, looking lost.

"Oh, darling." It was Wendy. "I couldn't get you at your place, and I was so nervous but I figured I just _had_ to try here. Everything is so awful, Stanley, I cannot even begin to describe it—"

Kyle grabbed my wrist, the one that wasn't occupied with the phone. "Is that _Wendy_?" he hissed. "You'll pick up the phone to speak to _Wendy_ when I am lying in front of you with my cock in your mouth?"

"Hold on a moment, Wends," I said into the phone, only to whisper to Kyle, "Well, how I was I to know it was she?"

"You certainly seemed insistent on picking it up!"

"I thought maybe it was your mother," I explained, although I felt I'd already covered this. "It rang about _15 times_."

"And what, you thought if it _was_ my mother, she might like to speak to the man with his fingers up my arse?"

"I thought she might need your help or something!"

"Stanley?" Wendy asked over the phone. "Hello?"

Kyle flopped back down on the bed, pouting.

"Yes, Wends, hi," I said cheerily as I could manage. "I'm sorry to say you've caught me at a rather off time. Are you well?"

She swallowed, and sniffed. "I'm afraid not. It's Token, dear, it's — we've been fighting so much, and I really thought things would be fine now, but they aren't, and he's been so, so … just, well, _furious_ at me, and I'm so livid at _him_, too, and I feel if I don't get out of the house I shall just _scream_, I don't know _what_ I'll do—"

"Wendy," I said stiffly, interrupting her. "What are you fighting about?"

Kyle was glowering at me, arms crossed, distraught.

"You," Wendy sobbed. She was obviously caught between crying jags. "Well, not you in general, but christening issues, and Token wants bloody _Craig_ and I suggested Bebe but Token _loathes_ Bebe so I said, what about Stanley? And we were just screaming and screaming at each other, like something out of a soap opera it was so horrid—"

I really only had the most general idea what she was talking about. "Have you tried deep breaths?" I suggested. The subtle ache in my jaw and Kyle's shocked look of indignity did little to keep me from hurrying her off the phone. "Cup of tea? Your husband's not a monster. He'll come to his senses."

"I don't know what to _do_," she wailed, dragging her _do_ across the receiver. "Can I come over? Please? I cannot be in this house any longer."

"Wendy, I don't—"

"Stanley, I need you."

She sounded so broken. What was I to say? "Okay, come over," I said. I pinched my nose, hard, the receiver tucked between my ear and shoulder.

"Thank you, mon cher, I mean it. I mean it!" She swallowed, and hung up. As did I.

"Do you still want a blow job?" I asked Kyle.

He threw his hands into the air. "You must be mad!" he shouted. "To think, my home is open season for all of your whiny little girlfriends!"

"She is really my only girlfriend," I said.

"What about that little blond brat?"

"Kenny isn't relevant to this conversation."

He got up off the bed, and began to search around the room for something to throw on. "I'll be in the bath," he said, grabbing something off the vanity, which may or may not have been flung there the night before, "helping myself, because I can't depend on you, obviously."

"Maybe if you didn't take so long to come," I shot back.

He slammed the door with force to rattle the drawers on his vanity.

XXX

Wendy arrived in a frightful state, her eyes swollen and her cheeks tear-stained. She had seriously debated cutting her hair off, but in the end decided to leave it. Now it was fit with some kind of Alice band, which I think was to keep it off of her face and neck if possible. It was still balmy in late August, and I think she was uncomfortable. I made certain not to ask her about it. What she did do was fold her arms across her stomach protectively, or perhaps to hide it if possible. There is nothing morally dubious about a married pregnant woman, but even the daughters of the most forward-thinking countesses sometimes bow to the Anglican shame of sex.

"Thank you for having me!" she cried, throwing her arms around my shoulders. "It's been dreadful, everything's been dreadful! I had to get out of the house. Token is such a _beast_."

"I'm sure he means well." I slipped her off of my body and brought her to the living room. "Here, just have a seat. Try not to think about it." I helped her onto the couch, steadying her by the shoulders.

"How can I not?" Her eyes became wide and frantic again. "All we do is fight, Stanley! He's just critical, critical, critical! There have been weeks when he's barely said a word to me that isn't an admonishment."

"Well, he's nervous," I reasoned. "It's his baby as well, I suppose. Perhaps husbands just get like this. I'm sure he doesn't mean it. Do you want a cup of tea?"

"Tea? Oh, no thank you, it is so bloody _hot_. Doesn't Kyle put on the air conditioning?"

"Yes, he does. It's on, in fact."

"This flat is really nice, but it's _so_ inefficient. Has he got a fan?"

He hadn't; Kyle felt fans were unsightly interruptions to his carefully cultivated décor.

So Wendy found a loose sheet of paper which she folded in half and used to fan herself. I brought her a glass of ice water in a squarish crystal tumbler.

"I'm _languishing_," she moaned, slurping water and fanning herself. "I always thought us so progressive, and he is being quite traditional about the whole thing. Godparents, really. What is the point?"

"I think the point is to have a stable figure in the child's life other than the parents. In case, perish the thought, something were to happen."

"What's to happen? The entire institution is so pointless! It's 1985! You should think this were the nineteenth century, the way he carries on about it!" She threw her arms into the air, still clutching her makeshift fan. "_Stanley_, please. What do I do?"

"I suppose Token will soften when he realizes he's distressed you," I suggested.

"Yes, of course he will. But I mean about the christening, dear, the christening. What do I do about the christening?"

Here I was entirely out of my depth. I knew little to nothing about Anglicanism — I knew more about Judaism, for obvious reasons, than I knew about the Church of England, and how my aristocratic betters handled themselves within its confines. "Well," I ventured, assuming it was best to play my hand with caution. "What are your options?"

She shot me a look that seemed to indicate that she knew I had no idea what we were discussing, precisely. "We did agree some time ago to compromise. For Token's part, he'd like to give the job to Craig." Wendy rolled her eyes. "Craig, you know — I relented on this point simply because there's no real reason to protest. He's a beast, of course, but there are worse things, I suppose, than allowing one's offspring fraternize with his poor little things, between him and Annie I think they are all scarred for life. In need of normal socialization, I assume. So, in addition to His Grace, I should like Bebe to receive the honor. But Token is adamantly against it! He feels Bebe is daft and wants nothing to do with her."

I couldn't say I blamed Token on that point.

"But she is my closest female friend!" Wendy continued. "She's quite respectable, and Jason is such a decent man, if a bit of a boorish pill. The children are lovely, too — good manners. What would be so awful about that?"

"Wendy, have you considered this entire thing could be resolved with the flip of a coin?"

"But it can't! I have no else _but_ Bebe!"

"Surely your mother has a friend?"

"It's hopeless!" She put her head in her hands. "I need an idea, Stanley! _Help me_."

At this inopportune moment, Kyle sauntered out of the bedroom, attired in a champagne-colored kimono that fell to just above the knee. Ike had brought this back for Kyle from his honeymoon in Kyoto, and Kyle had taken to wearing it with some regularity. Wendy had never seen him in it, however, so when she glanced up from the nest of her fingers and caught sight of him, she almost gagged.

"Oh." Kyle wrinkled his nose. "You are still here," as if he had no idea.

"Hello," she said, waving. "Kyle, hello." She attempted to rise to her feet.

Kyle shook his head. "Oh, don't get up," he drawled. "Your _condition_, et cetera. No one needs _that_."

She swallowed, and crossed her legs at the ankles. "All right."

"Will you be joining us for dinner?" he asked.

"Oh, I couldn't impose."

"Oh, _surely_ it's no imposition. Stanley was just taking me out for an early dinner, I was thinking French—"

I had been planning on doing no such thing.

"—and then of course after that, drinks with the boys."

"Ah." Wendy swallowed. "Er, which boys did you say?"

"Our friends, you know," he replied. "Butters and," here Kyle rolled his eyes, "_Dougie_, and Eric and that _thing_ he pays for."

"Kenny," I filled in. "He's a person, you know, not a thing."

"Oh." Wendy nodded in recognition. "Yes, the male prostitute."

"Yes, that's the one." Kyle smirked, crossing his arms as he leaned against the arm of the sofa. "What do you say?"

"I couldn't impose," she muttered.

"Oh, but Stanley is always imposing on your teas with the girls. Maybe you should join us for dinner and drinks. As long as you're here, you know. I think I'd be insulted if you didn't."

Wendy looked visibly uncomfortable, and not just from the heat. Kyle knew exactly how to tick her off, which was an amazing feat seeing as they had relatively little commonality besides me, and never spent any time together. Often it annoyed or even upset me that Kyle was so ready to use me as a tool or a weapon in his quest for subtle emotional subterfuge. But as she sat there fidgeting and Kyle kept smirking at her it occurred to me that this was less baseless antagonism of Wendy and more calculated payback for leaving him in a hard place, or what he perceived as cruel abandonment. But if he wasn't so damn set on making me tip him to climax I could have gotten him there in two minutes. Maybe it was best that this was the kind of pointless thing we disagreed on, rather than having actual problems.

"I suppose dinner couldn't hurt." She sighed. "If nothing else staying out later will agonize my husband on some level, and I should think he deserves it."

"Oh, problems, really? Well, you'll have to tell me over dinner." Kyle slipped off the couch, tugging down the hem of his dressing gown, although this was pointless. "I'll go ready myself. Stanley, perhaps you should offer her a drink, or something. I have a nice pinot noir I received from Sony—"

"I can't drink," she said, interrupting him. "I'm pregnant."

"Oh, that's right. Well, whatever. Like it matters. Won't be long!" He disappeared down the hallway.

Wendy put her head in her hands and moaned. "He is such a bitch, Stanley. _Really_."

The idea that she thought I didn't know this made me smile.

XXX

Indeed, a new Alsatian bistro had opened in Kyle's neighborhood, which I found rather curious, being that it was a type of cooking one never encountered just walking down the high street. The food was a sort of French-Germanic hybrid, very stew-ish and too heavy for the summer. Kyle was delighted, trying to converse with the old woman cook (we were the only people in the restaurant, which had lacy tablecloths and a flickering taper on each table) and she hadn't much in the way of English, so he didn't get very far. Instead, he was content to split with me a bottle of Riesling, and eat forkfuls of kraut with potatoes and slow-cooked pork. I had virtually the same dish, but with veal sausages. Eating veal gave me pause, but Kyle gave me a sort of look, a _stop deliberating and order _look, so I had them anyhow. Wendy, on the other hand, was uncomfortable and annoyed — with the close quarters, with the dim lighting, with the lack of air conditioning, with the richness of the food. She picked at an iceberg salad and pouted for half the meal.

Finally, Kyle asked her, "So, what brings you down?" It seemed to me to be a very general, if inviting, question.

"I'm not getting along with my husband," she said, as if to rub it in his face.

"Oh, but it's a great time for you. Cheer up."

"You wouldn't understand."

"I wouldn't? Try me."

So Wendy explained: "I'm excited, obviously, but Token — he is taking things very seriously. Too seriously, perhaps. I suppose, in one way of thinking, producing an heir is his only _real_ job, you know, so I understand, and — well, it's not as if my own family hasn't got similar concerns, even if the direct line of succession has been interrupted by now. It's just that — I don't know if you would empathize because I don't believe your relationship works the way mine does."

"Well, I should hope not," Kyle replied.

"I mean you boys don't live together, you don't — marriage is like a full-time job."

"I often feel Kyle is a full-time job," I said.

He smacked my shoulder. "That wasn't funny!"

But Wendy was giggling. "Sorry," she said. "No, it wasn't."

"It was a bit," Kyle admitted.

"Yes, it was. But, _really_." She put her elbows on the table, having to lean forward in a precarious way to accomplish the position. "We have ceremonial positions to fill. For some time we've been arguing about agreeing upon godparents. They will play a role in the Christening and other rites, and well, I cannot fathom what kind of life my unborn child would have if I died, but I think it's something _all_ parents must contemplate. And the crux of the issue is that, perhaps due to our differing _lifestyles_, we haven't got many titled friends around to saddle with this. So, what do I do?"

"What do you want to do?" I asked, and she explained again about Bebe and Craig.

"Oh, you mustn't decide to go with Craig," Kyle said. "He is an impossible man."

"But my only answer to Craig is Bebe, and Token would sooner let the baby raise itself. I have a second idea," she said, "which is to give the job to you, Stanley. But I don't—"

"Hold up a moment," I said, interrupting her. "_Me_?"

"You could raise a baby," she said.

"Well, I _could_," I replied, in a way that suggested I just as well couldn't, or perhaps indeed I could but just as well shouldn't.

"Token likes you very much," she said, and I noticed Kyle's brows lower at this. "I don't mean in any salacious way, just that he's fond of you and so am I."

The sentiment delighted Kyle. "Stanley is wonderful," he said, sounding almost dreamy. "I think he would be an impeccable influence on your child, you know. He's got eight nieces and nephews" — as if this were somehow to my credit, a line from my _curriculum vitae_ — "and he's very handy with a needle and thread. Or in any emergency, really."

"Well, if he's going to do this, there remains an obstacle, and that is convincing Token."

"How do you usually 'convince' him?" Kyle asked, making inverted commas with his fingers around the word _convincing_.

"Oh, surely not like _that_," said Wendy. "I won't say we never have our moments but I think gestation is rather a turn-off for him."

"He's not the only one," Kyle added. "Regardless, I think Stanley would make a good godparent."

"Agreed."

"Wait just a damn minute," I said. This moment was very surreal. Obviously Wendy was a very close friend, but I had nothing to do with her particular social strata, and even less to do with Anglican rituals of birth and succession. What was more, it was quite unusual to hear Kyle speak _of_ me, _to _another person. "I think you've got to ask me whether this is something I'll agree to, and—"

"—and of course you'll say yes," Kyle said, finishing the sentiment for me. (This was not exactly what I was planning on saying.)

"But first you've got to speak with Token," Wendy said. "He'll be amenable if you catch him in a place where he's happy. I'll set up some court time, maybe. Has it been long since you've last played racquetball?"

"You _know_ I don't play racquetball!"

"Well, Token will enjoy your defeat, then."

This was the end of the discussion. Wendy was so delighted with the outcome that she paid, in cash, for our dinner — a gesture with which Kyle was notably grateful. After that, he looked her in the eye when he spoke to her. I had never noticed that he didn't do this until he began doing it.

XXX

It was a very quick walk back to Kyle's place, although we were a bit tardy because Wendy no longer strode but rather, kind of hobbled over the chipped pavements. "They need to do something about this," she said, stepping gingerly over a large crack in the ground at the corner of Kyle's building.

"Oh, they will," he said. "Eventually. London's a big city. This is a decent borough. Stanley lives in a demilitarized zone — you should see the pavements over there."

"_Really_, darling."

"Far cry from Mayfair," she said.

"Oh, we're just around the corner," Kyle replied — although I wasn't sure if he meant from his flat, or Mayfair.

Being late, we had the misfortune of running into Eric (and Kenny) in the vestibule of the building. "It's about time, Jew," he said, shaking his wrist in Kyle's face, where a heavy gold watch rattled. "You are the least gracious hostess, leaving us here to perspire while you and your entourage cavort around town."

"Yes, some entourage." Kyle sniffed. "Stanley, and — oh, you must know, but Kenneth doesn't. Come here, dear. May I present Wilhelmina Testaburger-Williams, the right honorable the Viscountess Black—"

Wendy did not step forward to take Kenny's hand, but had frozen entirely, hanging back as far from others as possible. Her eyes were wide with terror, her mouth agape. I wondered if perhaps she had come across Kenny someplace before.

"Wendy," I said. "Are you all right?"

"No," she whispered, shaking her head. I turned to look at Kyle — and caught a glimpse of Eric, who shared Wendy's look of shock. It dawned on me — she was not gaping at Kenny; she was horrified to have run into Eric.

Kenny had obviously noticed her discomfort. "Am I that awful to look at?" he asked. (He was pleasant to look at, actually — Eric had forced him to do something about his teeth, and they were bracketed with wiring, in the process of being forced into two neat little rows. But other than that, Kenny was flawless-looking, now that he had some nice jeans and no longer wore holey sweatshirts.)

"It's been ages," Wendy said. She was beginning to recover from her shock, and now seemed merely awed.

"_Ages_," Eric repeated.

"Well, the vestibule is rather tiny, so maybe we should all go upstairs," Kyle suggested.

"No." Eric stepped forward, and Wendy shrank back from him.

"Eric," she said, looking at this gut. "You look _horrible_."

"I've looked worse," he said, and it was true — if Wendy thought Eric looked bad now, she should have seen him a few years back, before he'd lost a bit of weight; he'd dropped several stone, maybe, and it was quite noticeable to anyone who saw Eric on a regular basis. But he was still the fattest person I knew, and if Wendy really hadn't seen him since her wedding, or whenever, she _would _be shocked. The Eric _she'd_ known was a handsome rower.

"How are you?" she asked, trying to regain some composure.

"How am I? You want to know how I am. Maybe you should have _called_, Wendy. Excuse me — the right honorable the _Lady Black_."

"Viscountess," she whispered. Then, in a louder voice, she said, "Oh, but it doesn't matter. Eric—"

"So it seems you're with child or something."

"Well, _yes_."

"Again."

"_I suppose_."

"Ah, you suppose. Yes, well. I'm sure it doesn't count if the father isn't a negroid half-queen with a peerage, hmm? You're keeping it, I assume. Or is it even his?" Eric paused to lean into her personal space, his eyes narrowing. "How stupid of me. Yes, of course, it _must_ be, or everyone would know. Delighted to know he can still get it up for you, _Viscountess_. But then, you were always such a beautiful girl—"

I was about to grab Eric by the shoulders and force him from her, cornered in the muggy and narrow vestibule, but she shrieked, "Oh, get off me, Eric!" and slapped him.

Eric brought his hand to his face, processing that he'd just been smacked by a woman. "Very well," he said. After he cleared his throat, he barked, "We're leaving!" and stormed out of Kyle's building.

"Much obliged," Kenny said in a cheery tone. He turned to me and blew me a kiss, then took a stop forward, taking Wendy's hand in his. "Old wounds, you know." Then he leaned in, and in a _sotto_ voice, said, "You're just as attractive as he always said you were." Then he left.

Wendy was still in the corner of the vestibule, cheeks red and sweat matting her bangs to her forehead.

"What the bloody hell was that?" Kyle asked, just as Butters and Dougie were arriving.

"Sorry for the delay," Butters gasped; it seemed he and Dougie had been rushing to overcome their lateness. "I just saw Eric veritably _fleeing_ from here. What are you all doing in the vestibule?"

"Let's go upstairs," I said. "It's high time I got drunk."

"I wish I could join you," Wendy said.

"What exactly happened?" Dougie asked, as we all piled into the lift.

"I'll explain upstairs," Wendy said. "I believe we haven't met."

"Douglas." Dougie reached clear over Kyle to take her hand. "Charmed. I'm Leopold's, uh." His face went red and he stammered, "I'm … I'm here with him."

"We're friends," said Miss B, not sparing Dougie a glance.

"And, pardon my rudeness, but who are you?" Wendy asked.

The lift reached Kyle's level, the third floor, and we all poured out of it. Kyle grabbed my arm, giving me the key so I could open the door to his flat.

"I'm sure we've met," Butters said, bending over to get off his trainers. "It's 'Butters,' actually—"

"Oh, Miss B!" Wendy cheered in recognition. "It's been years, I'm sure. I saw you at The Closet, in '69 or thereabouts! Oh, you were marvelous. I always begged Stanley to take me, but I'm sure he thought bringing a society matron to such a place was highly inappropriate—"

"I'm sure it interfered with his tricking," Kyle said. He was just returning from the fridge with a bottle of Moet. "I have _this_," he said, setting it on the counter. "Just the departure of Eric is a cause for celebration, I should think. Yes?"

"Oh, _really_." Wendy sat down in a dining chair, putting her head in her hands. "_That_ was something I was really unprepared for."

"How long is it been since you've seen him?" I asked.

"I think the last time was at my wedding, so — it's 1985? Oh, 15 years — no, Token and I were married in early '68 so—"

"—a long time," said Dougie, filling in the blanks.

"Yes, thank you," Wendy said. "A _long_ time. Eternities. When did he get so hugely obese?"

"I _told_ you he was," I said.

Kyle returned with two flutes of champagne, one of which he handed to me, coming to join our little circle around the dining table, the men all standing and Wendy at the head, in an armed chair. "Oh, god, no one could be prepared for Eric Cartman. I see him on a weekly basis and he startles me on each and every occasion." Kyle pointed to the chair to Wendy's left and I set down my glass, pulling the chair out for him.

"Thank you," he said, squeezing my hand. "Everyone should have a drink. Wendy, dear, do you need anything?"

"Oh, my thank you, no," she said. The rapidity of her words suggested she was still quite rattled. "Just to put this unpleasant day behind me."

XXX

In early October, Wendy delivered a daughter, robust and squalling, by Caesarian section. After her parents, Token, and improbably, Bebe, I had the honor of meeting Lady Wilhelmina (Something, Something — these aristocrats and their elongated names confused me) Testaburger-Williams. It seemed backward and odd to me that they saddled her with Wendy's full name, but they assured me they'd call her 'Willa' instead, since _Wilhelmina_ seemed heavy indeed for a tiny baby. She was docile and quiet in my arms the first time I held her, sitting in Wendy's ward at the Portland Hospital, where sun poured in despite the fact that it was an unusually cold day.

"I think she likes you," Wendy said of her daughter. Willa had skin the color of milky tea, inky infant hair, and a nose that seemed a bit large for her face. Still, she charmed me, swaddled in pink, eyes open and curious. The noises Willa made didn't sound like anything, any kind of language — this baby was mere hours old and she reminded me of all the excellent times yet to come. I liked that about her, about children in general. Or at least, the idea of children. Anyway, Willa was a beautiful baby. Her mother, exhausted and pale with her hair up in a messy bun, seemed accomplished and proud.

Token had a new Polaroid camera, and he took photos of me with the baby, and then one of me and Wendy, and then one of me and Wendy with the baby. Wendy put up a protest for show, complaining about her hair and her general lack of composure, but Token was actually so pleased with himself and with the occasion that he did not cease with the photography, pausing to reload the film in his camera several times, until Willa forced him to by erupting into wailing cries.

"Oh, well, look at that, Token," Wendy protested, lurching forward to return Willa to the acrylic-looking thing she'd been sleeping in. "I think you've upset her."

"I think she's a baby," Token replied. He paused to put the camera away in its leather case. He picked up a photo and began to shake it out. "I think babies cry."

"Oh, too much excitement." Wendy grimaced, and I helped her back into bed. "I'm so happy for once I keep forgetting how lousy I feel."

"Maybe I should go, then," I offered.

"I'm sorry to say I think that's best," Wendy replied. "I'm so glad you came, though. Token's parents are so late, it's good that you were here to keep us entertained."

"I think they're caught in traffic, you know," Token theorized. "Trying to get in on the A40 during the commute times is really something of an ordeal."

"They could have just taken the train, you know. Or come the night before. This delivery was scheduled for _weeks_. It's like they didn't want to be here."

"I can't explain my parents' behavior. Of course, they _wanted_ to be here—"

"Well, I'm glad to have been here," I said. I was totally unable to take my eyes off Willa. She was still crying, and it was beyond me what it was that she wanted, but somehow her cries were more entrancing than her placidity. "I absolutely love her."

"We do too," Token agreed, "even without having slept for two days."

"Oh, like you have any idea, really. But I agree that she's worth it. On the way out, Stanley, would you send in a nurse? I really feel dreadful. I wonder what she's crying for?"

"Is she hungry?" I asked.

"She'll need formula if she is," Wendy said.

"That's not the only way to feed a baby," Token suggested.

"I'm not having _this _discussion again." Wendy sunk into the pillows as Willa's cries grew louder. "A nurse, Stanley, please? I'd appreciate it so much."

"Of course." I gathered my trench in my arms, all ready to head out to meet Kyle for lunch.

"And take these." Token handed me a stack of about four Polaroids.

"And a nurse, please." Wendy shut her eyes.

As I ambled to the nurses' station, I could hear the baby's cries following me down the hall. It was only when I located someone I could send over to Wendy that I realized the entire corridor was full of wailing infants.

XXX

Kyle worked in a strident, fascist mid-rise right on Hyde Park. To get into his office one had to speak to a doorman who sat a desk, and would ring up to the switchboard, at which an operator would connect one to Kyle's secretary, who would then grant you permission to get on the elevator. At this point one would have to sign in with the doorman, leaving him some form identification. The entire thing was awful and Orwellian. Most often Kyle's secretary would _not_ let me come upstairs but rather, would have the doorman tell me, "He'll be right down," and he would be, although this was Kyle so of course being "right down" was a process of something like seven to 12 minutes.

In any case, Kyle met me in the lobby, grabbing the belt of my coat and giving me a cordial kiss on the cheek. Then he asked, "Your place, or mine?" Then he shook his head. "Oh, what am I saying? Mine's closer. I've only an hour."

"What are you talking about?" I asked.

"Well, lunch, of course." He arched his eyebrows at 'lunch.'

"Oh." I blinked at him, certain the doorman was staring at us. "Aren't you hungry?"

"Of course I'm hungry." He grabbed my arm and led me outside, beginning to scan the street for a taxi. "I can make some sandwiches. I've that leftover tuna salad in the fridge, you know," from having his parents over for brunch on Sunday, "and I think some croissants leftover as well, from that patisserie, do you remember, off Covent Garden?"

Of course I remembered. We had gotten caught in the rain, and it was quite cold out, nearly freezing though it was only October, and my trainers were soaked and we ended up sitting at a counter for two hours, drinking lattes and talking about my birthday. In roughly a week, I would turn 40. My mother expected me to come to Oxford and spend the night, attend a birthday dinner in my honor, socialize with my family.

The prospect of having to do this wasn't welcome.

My birthday was that coming Saturday night, and there was a host of other things I might like to do on Saturday night — read, write, drink, take Kyle to the opera, fuck him face-down on my floorboards, making him squirm just enough. If I went to my mother's, I would be able to drink to my heart's content. Reading, writing, and fucking, though — none of that was going to be possible. Opera was obviously out of the question.

So I'd dragged Kyle out to Covent Garden, just because I felt it would be nice to get out, and also because it was more likely he'd agree to come along if he wasn't in a position to factor in too many inconsequential details. Lucky me, he did say he would come along, but then it began to pour and we spent the next two hours in a café, eating croissants and drinking lattes — Kyle was so smitten with the croissants that he brought a bag home with him. He kept asking me, "What do you want for your birthday?" All I _did_ want was to spend a nice evening at the opera without having to review it, but since that was no longer possible, all I wanted was for him to come to a birthday dinner with me in Oxford. All things considered, it was a tidy evening. When I returned home that evening, I received the news that Wendy was in labor.

Anyway, now we were sitting in a big black cab, en route to his flat, where we were going to fuck and eat sandwiches of leftover tuna mayo, apparently. As usual, Kyle was attempting to be seductive, unaware that I found him alluring without theatrics, just by virtue of being Kyle Broflovski. It did occur to me that I should tell him this, but I was rarely one to turn down the opportunity to snog in the backseat of a taxi.

Back at his flat, Kyle unlocked the door and ran back to the bedroom, expecting me to chase him, which I did. He shed his jacket and stretched out on the bed, leaning back and sucking a finger.

"Hold on," I said, unbuttoning my coat. "You're in a mood, eh?"

"You've no idea."

I joined him on the bed, kissing him up and down his jaw, all the way to his hairline.

When leaving the hospital earlier, I really had just assumed we were going out to lunch. Now I had Kyle slouching against the pillows on his bed while I straddled his chest, thrusting into his mouth in time with a noisy clock that sat by the bedside. Sometimes I wished he would be a bit more proactive and actually suck me off, but after a few years of this I'd come to accept that he felt he was a passive factor in his own sex life, having things done to him or, at best, being made to do things. It had never really occurred to me that perhaps I should bark orders at him, as the idea of forcing Kyle to do anything was a turn off; I wanted him to desire it, not to be made to perform. I suppose taking care of him felt rewarding, and plunging my cock down his throat felt about as good as it sounds, but I thought our sex life worked best when Kyle was more of an active participant than curious bystander.

By this point, he was making odd mewling noises, grasping at my arse and straining to look up at me. Pausing my thrusts for a moment, I cupped his cheek and said, "You can use a finger if you like," in what I hoped was a sultry (rather than formal) way.

To this, he pushed at me until I understood what he wanted and pulled away, my hard, wet cock kept from springing away when he clasped it in his warm hands. "I want you to fuck me," he said, purring this against my belly while he stroked and tugged at my balls. (It was a wonder I didn't just explode in his face right there.) "Please fill me up?" It was another of those treacherous interrogatives — totally pointless, as if there was some way in hell I might decline.

Getting off my knees, I wrapped my arms around him, running my lips against his. "I filled you up first thing this morning, and last thing yesterday night," I said. "You're insatiable, Kyle. I love it."

"I'm a greedy whore. It's never enough."

"If you want me to fuck you, you'd better let me bring you off while I'm doing it." My hand fell from the small of his back to the curve of his behind. "I want to feel you come while I'm inside you this time. No more games."

"Well, of course," he said, breaking the act. "I have to get back to work on time."

"Great." I tipped his head back and kissed him, withholding my tongue, bringing my teeth around his bottom lip.

It proved to be an efficient found of brisk, enjoyable fucking. There are really only so many ways to bugger a person, but I wasn't sure we'd found them all just yet. For the sake of timeliness I took him face-down on the mattress, crushing into him until I felt my knees going raw against the quilt. I forced him to flip over, and moved his hands to his cock so he could bring himself off. I wasn't exactly paying attention to the time, but after collapsing on his chest and catching my breath for a moment, I looked at it and realized the whole thing, from the door to this moment, couldn't have taken more than 12 minutes.

"Brilliant," he said, playing with my hair. "You're brilliant at fucking, do you know that?"

"I think if I were brilliant at fucking you'd want to do it less frequently."

"Why?"

"Because you'd be more sated."

He pushed me off of him, and sat up, wiping the drying sperm from his navel. "It's that you're so good at it that I want to do it all the time. Or maybe you're horrible at it, but I like the idea that you want to be here, doing it with me."

We got dressed — or, rather, he got dressed, peeling his clothing from the floor where we'd left it, sniffing each sock before inching it back up his calf. I clung to a pillow, naked and shivering, watching him dress. "Oh," he said, noticing me. "Are you cold?"

"Not really."

"Here." With his shirt halfway buttoned, he leaned from the vanity to the gurgling old radiator and toyed with a knob. From the floor, he rescued my trench coat, laying it out across the bed. "This will wrinkle," he said.

"I don't care."

"Oh, don't be like that. Be a grown up."

"Grown up?" I had been feeling quite sleepy, but this made me raise my head, and I began to rifle through the pockets of my jacket. "Here, you've got to look at the pictures."

"Of what?" He was buttoning his waistcoat now, pausing to feel down the seams as if it were a corset, pinching him too tight.

"Willa," I replied, handing him the short stack of Polaroids. "Little Willa, my goddaughter."

He made a face that seemed so repulsed I almost recoiled, wondering what I'd done wrong. Kyle inspected each photograph, biting his lip and shaking his head. After a few minutes, he set them aside. "Very well," he said quietly. "I think I'm too fat."

"You're not fat, and don't change the subject."

"What subject? Good pictures, dear. Fascinating, a baby."

"Don't be so sarcastic."

"I'm not sarcastic, I'm hungry."

I threw off the covers and began to idly search the floor for _my_ pants. Finding them, I hopped up and pulled them on. "You're not really jealous of a day-old _infant_, of course."

"Not exactly." A discomforted look crossed Kyle's face, almost as if he were going to vomit. "Did you ever think about having children?"

I had finally found my shirt, black, short-sleeved, and nondescript; I pulled it over my head while I thought about his question. "You mean, with you?" I asked.

"Just in general." He glanced back at the pile of photographs. "Did you ever think you would have any?"

I was certain we'd talked about this before, but couldn't recall when it might have been. Years ago, surely. "I don't think the idea ever crossed my mind," I said, which was true. "I wouldn't make a very good father. My mother would speak to me when I was younger, to the general gist that it was expected I would grow up and breed more Catholics, but when I was quite young such a concept seemed impossible, and then I understood I was queer, so—"

He interrupted me. "I always assumed I would have them. Which is odd, isn't it, because I always knew I wouldn't. Like I held both ideas within me at the same time. I do sometimes think about them — Token, I mean, and Craig. How they've — they've gotten to live two sorts of lives, both being homosexual and having fairly typical families. I knew I wouldn't be able to pass, and it's not something I wanted, but until I was well into university it was as if — like there were two of me, do you understand? One who would be normal, and another who could never be. I don't know how to explain it, just that that I think about my future, I don't really _see_ anything."

I couldn't _see_ my future either, exactly, but I just assumed it would be with him.

We ate tuna mayo in the parlor, and Kyle kept glancing at the photographs of Willa. "She's quite a pretty baby," he admitted, finally. "They're pretty people, I suppose, to make such a lovely thing."

"We're pretty people too," I said.

Kyle snorted at that. "You're handsome. I don't know what the hell I look like."

"You're adorable," I replied.

"Thanks."

"No problem."

"What are you going to do while I'm finishing work?"

I shrugged, having not really thought about it. "Mope around here, I suppose. Listen to Radio 4."

When he left for the office, he kissed me on the jaw and said, "If you weren't with me, I'd be nothing."

This prompted me to consider the reverse. If I hadn't Kyle, I would have been the exact same way, just sadder. "You were something before me and you'd be something without me if you had to be," I said.

"Well, don't let that happen! Don't let that baby supplant me."

"She's not even my baby!"

"Well, thank god for _that_."

When Kyle had left, I called Kenny and invited him over.

XXX

"It's my birthday next week, you know. I'm going to be 40."

"Well, you're ancient," Kenny replied. We were having tea at Kyle's kitchen counter, and rather than looking at him, I was looking at his reflection in the black marble. Something about its glossy, glinting surface made everyone look better — it smoothed out lines, I suppose, not that Kenny _had_ lines. "If I were you, I'd deeply consider throwing myself off of a bridge."

"Someday you _will_ be in my position, you naïve little brat," I said, not really concerned with whether or not this hurt his feelings. "Eric turned 40 in July, if you recall. It seems to have done him _loads_ of good."

Indeed, Eric's 40th birthday had been a spectacular night of debauchery — for him and Kenny, who spent it taking figurative baths in cocaine and almost-literal baths in some kind of pricey 1945-vintage red wine from the Loire, which didn't smell appetizing to me, and most of it was ending up on the floor and soaking their shirtsleeves anyway. It was a rare, rare occasion that we went to Eric's flat, and Kyle and I had been there for an hour before agreeing that the entire scene was just embarrassing for everyone, and we left. Poor Butters, on the other hand, had felt an obligation to Eric (as his closest friend, or whatever approximation of friendship Eric was capable of maintaining) and was compelled _not_ to leave; he and Dougie had just stood in the corner sipping wine and looking out-of-place. Eric lived in the City, and no one I had ever known lived in the City. It was impossible to find a cab, or anything to eat, or even signs of life. We had walked up Farringdon and caught a bus back to my place. Eric's idea of 'entertaining' seemed to be forcing others to watch him entertain himself.

Kenny was thinking, quiet and concentrated, maybe reliving this night — although it was just as likely that he couldn't remember a damn thing that had happened. Finally, he said, "I don't care so much about numbers. Age is really about how you act, I suppose. Eric doesn't really act like a 40-year-old — not with me. I mean, he barely acts like a human being, after all."

I snorted at this pedantic insight. Then I realized something: "I don't think we've ever celebrated your birthday, Kenny. When is it?"

"Oh, who even cares?" He shrugged, raising his eyes, trying to act nonchalant. "I'm not really bothered by it."

"Do you know when it is?"

"Yes, of course I do," he snapped. "I'm from Shankill, not some African village in the 1800s. I didn't come from _nowhere_. I was born at some point this century, anyway."

"But _when_?"

"Why do you want to know so badly?" He made a cross face. "What's it to you?"

"Well, you are a person, and here you are."

"And here I am, so why does it matter where or when I originated?"

"Do you speak Irish?" I asked.

"Excuse me, _what_? Do I? Why does it matter?"

"I know a little French, from Wendy, mostly, although I think you just pick it up in the world, or certain strata of the world. I 'know' Latin, of course, but to speak it is perfectly useless and not exactly a skill worth cultivating. I can read it quite well, though, or I _could_ in Latin tutorials. Everyone loves the classics, right?"

"_Ich kann sprechen ein bissen Deutch_," he said, not really by way of answer.

"Well, where did you learn _that_?"

"Eric speaks it. He speaks it with his mother."

"You mean she's still _alive_?" I didn't know why this seemed so impossible to me. My parents were still alive and they were probably similar in age to Eric's mother, if not a bit older.

"Is she _alive_? Of course. She lives with us."

"Eric lives with his _mother_?" I don't know why I found this so surprising. Eric was exactly the sort of 40-year-old man who _would_ live with his mother. (And catamite lover, of course. Obviously.)

"Well, yes. It's rather sweet, isn't it?" (I didn't know about that.) "She's interesting, Mrs. Cartman. She only speaks German so I've had to scratch a little together if I want to speak to her. Eric generally tells me _not_ to speak to her, and when I do she attempts to seduce me, you know. Very literary and fucked-up. They speak it to each other, anyway, especially around me because while I think she _understands_ English all right, if they talk in German I can't understand them properly, and I often wonder what they're saying." This was an unprecedented amount of information about Kenny's life. He continued: "I'll answer your fucking question, then, all right? I don't speak Gaelic, no, but I can understand chunks of it. My _father_ could speak it, and in fact he and my mother would scream at each other, great big fights that subsided very quickly."

"Your father _spoke_ Irish?" I asked.

"Well, _speaks_. I guess." He shrugged. "Look at all you know about me _now_, huh?"

But it wasn't really anything about _him_, just things he'd observed about people he knew. I wondered what he knew about me, or what he'd picked up about me and Kyle. I didn't dare ask. Instead, I excused myself, and went to the mantel to retrieve the pictures of Willa.

"This is my goddaughter," I said, beginning to like the way that sounded. "Her name is Wilhelmina, but they intend to call her 'Willa.' She's just a day old."

He looked at the pictures, particularly the one of me and Wendy with the baby. "Aside from the fact it's African, you look like a very natural family," he said. "Well, part-African. It's obviously not your baby. But it _could_ be, I'm sure."

"Well, I don't really know what _that_ means," I said.

He smirked. "My birthday's in March," he said, handing the Polaroids back to me, "and that's all you need to know."

XXX

Exactly a week later, I met Kyle at Paddington after work. Or after his work, rather — I had spent the majority of my day writing, with brief visits to Wendy and her shrill infant and the swimming pool. Wendy told me she was sending me a birthday gift, but that with the baby, she'd lost track of the date and was highly out of sorts. She looked it, too, pale with watery eyes, her voice hoarse but lifeless.

"It's all right," I had told her, taking her by the hand. "I'm sure Willa's a lot to deal with."

"Oh, it isn't her, Stanley, she's perfect; it's me. I've known it was your birthday for ages now. I should have made arrangements, or something, I should have put my affairs in order _before_ the baby—"

"Don't be drastic," I had said. "You don't owe me anything."

"I feel so … listless." She had showed me to the door, pecked me on the lips and said, "Happy birthday. I do mean it."

"You'll recover, _I_ mean it. It's a lot of work forcing something this size"—I held up my hands about a foot apart — "out of something _this_ size." I made a little ring with my thumb and forefinger, peering through it at Wendy.

"Well, yes, although I had a caesarian section. I think _you're_ the one who's always trying to get something _this_ big" — she mimicked my foot-length gesture, and then tightened her fingers into a fist — "through something like _this_."

I laughed. "I suppose, although it's a comparison that works only on a conceptual level."

Wendy let me wrap her in my arms, a kind of closeness we shared only on rare occasions; this one seemed calmer than usual, less melancholy. "You're doing so well," I said.

"But I wish to do better," she had replied. "Do have a happy birthday, though." At that, we had parted.

When I met Kyle at the train station, next to a Barclays branch near the ticket windows, he looked exhausted, holding what appeared to be a kind of quiche or a tart, a large and slouchy bag slung over his shoulder.

"What is that?" I asked.

"This is my luggage," he said, slipping the bag off so I could take it from him, "and this is a quiche."

"What kind?"

"Who cares what kind? It's not for you, Stanley. It's for your mother."

"My mother?"

"Yes, it's a hostess gift," he said, sounding weary, which I chalked up to his day at the office. "It's like you were raised by no one, really. If you are someone's overnight guest, you've got to bring them something."

"If you think my manners are so bad that no one bothered to raise me, why do you believe my mother will care if you bring her a quiche?"

"I'm too tired to be hilarious right now, sorry. I thought work would never end!"

"You had time to pack that ridiculous bag, though. Where do you think we're going? It's only two nights."

"You haven't even brought anything!" he snapped.

It was true. I hadn't packed a single thing, assuming my mother would have a toothbrush I could borrow, and I intended not to sleep in pajamas or even change clothes. There was something about traveling to my childhood home that made me reluctant to prepare. "Things do have a way of fixing themselves," I said.

"You're insufferable!"

"I don't think that's what you were saying when I was eating your dish last night."

"Not in public! Christ, Stanley!"

I was positive no one in public knew what I was talking about.

We settled into front-facing seats on the Great Western, but declined to get too comfortable — we would have to change at Reading, and even then, it was not a very long journey. It never failed to amaze me how packed the Friday evening rush trains out of London could be, but Kyle and I managed to snag two with a table, and he set the quiche down on it; I stuffed his satchel up above.

"What sort of quiche is it?" I asked, sitting down.

"Oh, er, rocket and parma ham—"

"What sort of person likes rocket in a quiche?"

"—with _tomato_, Stanley, I mean _really_. It's a nice thing and I think your mother will like it. And you smell like a lap pool!"

"I did laps."

"Shower next time!"

"I did shower."

"Do a better job."

"I thought the scent of the chlorine made you ho — oh, _hello_." A woman in a suit with monstrous shoulder pads, a matching red scowl slashed across her face, sat down across from us. "Welcome to the train."

Instead of replying, she turned away to state out the window.

I looked to Kyle and rolled my eyes, mouthing the word _cunt_, which made him laugh. From the breast pocket of his waistcoat he produced a pen and a folded-over envelope, onto which he scrawled, _I had no idea it was fashionable to dress like a telephone box_.

Train journeys only present so many variables, but by the time we stumbled off at the familiar Oxford station, it was nighttime. As the locomotive sped off, we were left on the platform with a handful of commuters, desperate to get home, embracing wives and children, or being greeted by taxi drivers with placards.

"Who's meeting us here?" Kyle asked.

"My mother, I can only assume."

"Is it like her to be tardy? The train was supposed to get in at 7:29 promptly."

"What time is it now?"

"Well, don't look at me," he said. "I haven't a pocket watch."

"Let's go sit on that bench, and if she's not here in five minutes, I'll give her a call."

"How will we know it's been five minutes if neither of us has got a watch?"

"Let me know when you get bored?" I shrugged. Carrying Kyle's overnight bag was becoming annoying — it wasn't heavy, but it was an odd shape, and the thin strap was biting into my shoulder, even through my trench coat. So I sat down on a bench, and Kyle followed, settling against me, head on my shoulder. "Long day, darling?"

"Miserably tired," he said. The quiche was resting on his thighs. "I wish you didn't smell of chlorine."

"There's not much I can do about it, I suppose." There was traffic on the road before us, but other than that, the night was still, despite our relative proximity to the town center. "Thanks for coming with me."

"Well, I suppose it is your birthday." He sighed.

To my great shock and bewilderment, my mother did not fetch us from the station. Rather, it was my heavily pregnant sister, who sputtered up in an old saloon car, her 1971 Rover P6. In the dark it was impossible to tell, as everything looked somewhat muddy, but the car was the most appalling color of mushy peas that had sat for too long and oxidized. She did not bother getting out of the vehicle to greet us, choosing instead to lean on the horn until we climbed in.

"Hello, Shells," I said, in as pleasant a tone I could muster. "Mum busy?"

"Her car's in the shop, wouldn't borrow Dad's, busy cooking," my sister replied, craning her neck to get a glimpse of Kyle in the backseat. "Traded her a favor for childcare. Didn't realize you were bringing a guest, though."

Kyle lurched forward to offer a hand over the seat. "It's been too long," he said, trepidation audible. "I suppose you mightn't remember me, Kyle Broflovski—"

"Of _course_ I remember you," she said, in a tone that seemed sharp and accusatory, rather than familiar. She peered at his hand with suspicion instead of taking it. "How many ginger Jews do you think my brother hangs around with?"

"Very few," I said.

"Oh, be quiet. I didn't pick you up to have a conversation. I'll drop you off at Mum and Dad's but then I'm going home."

"It's what, Shells, 8 p.m.?"

"The children need supper, though," she replied. "I'm not in a great mood so don't even try to speak to me."

"May I speak to Kyle, then?"

"I'd prefer if you didn't."

It was a 20-minute drive, and we passed it in silence, save for the tranquil pop music of the car wireless droning in the background. When we did pull up to my childhood home, a squat two-storey row house with green paint peeling from the brick façade, I tried to shake my sister's hand, and she refused to take it.

"I'm not diseased," I said, somewhat hurt.

"Just get out of my car." She rolled down her window, and leaned over to rescue a half-smoked cigarette from the brimming ashtray square in the middle of the front seat. "Oh, but first be a dear and light this." She plucked a lighter from underneath her own behind and stuck it in my face, leaving me with no choice but to comply.

"Isn't smoking during pregnancy something of a health risk?" Kyle asked.

She frowned as smoke wafted from her nostrils. "You're not a surgeon, are you?"

"Oh, no, but my brother is, and I work with tobacco companies — they are very well aware of the dangers of smoking, especially during gestation, and—"

"Then piss off, thanks." She slammed her hand against the steering wheel. "All right, I want to get home. Out of my car. Out, out, _out_."

She'd zoomed off even before we'd made it to the front door.

XXX

I'd be reluctant to say that my father was pleased to see me, but my mother was overjoyed almost to the point of parody. She threw her arms around me and kissed both of my cheeks and would have swung me around, if I weren't too heavy and tall to swing. "It's been so long," she said, with a kind of distant sound in her voice. "Happy birthday, Stanley. Daddy and I have missed you so much."

I wasn't sure about Daddy, but her joy seemed genuine. "It hasn't been that long," I said. "Only since Easter."

"That's months now!"

"Oh." It still didn't seem that long to me. I stepped back and nodded toward Kyle, who was standing by the doorway with his quiche in hand, our luggage (or rather, _his_ luggage) at his feet, an uncertain half-smile on his face. "You remember Kyle, don't you?"

At this point her entire demeanor changed, evening out to a metered, casual tone. "Of course," she said, nodding. "Hello."

"Thank you for having me, Mrs. Marsh." Kyle tried to reach out for her hand, but because he was holding the quiche he wavered a bit, and ended up doing a kind of curtsey.

"Of course," my mother repeated — slower this time. "I, well—I had no idea you were bringing a guest, Stanley. If you'd told me you were bringing a guest I'd have made your sister's room up."

"Why shouldn't I bring a guest?" I asked. "It's my party."

My mother shrugged. "I suppose."

"We can share my room. That's fine," I said cautiously.

"Really, Stanley? It's such a small room for two."

"I don't mind," Kyle ventured, not realizing his minding wasn't at the forefront of my mother's concern.

"Just do what you'd like." She sighed, her former enthusiasm vanquished. Now she both sounded and looked frustrated, and old. "Just don't mind me. One room, two rooms, it's none of my concern. Have you boys got plans?"

"You mean, before dinner tomorrow night?"

"In general."

"Well, I don't know," I said, turning to see that Kyle was still holding his quiche and biting his lip. "It's only a day, which isn't _that_ long. We'll figure something out."

"Yes," she said. "I'm sure you will. You can leave that pie—"

(Kyle, in a low voice: "It's a quiche.")

"—in the kitchen. I'll see you boys tomorrow morning. Breakfast is at 8," as if perhaps the threat of breakfast might keep us from being unseemly. "Glad you're back," she added, but it sounded hollow this time.

XXX

Difficult as it was to believe, there had been a time in my life when Oxford was exciting. When I went up to Magdalen and met Kyle, the ancient town seemed just a bit larger. High on drugs and deluded by possibilities, we laughed at the most absurd things and sat by the river, dipping our feet in if the day was warm enough to walk back to the rooms barefoot. When I invited Kyle to my birthday dinner, I had these afternoons in mind, reading about Hogarth and clacking away at our theses while we drank thick red wine out of tea cups.

On my 40th birthday, a Saturday, violent rain fell on Oxford and it was so dark out by 2 that the afternoon felt preternatural. My mother dispatched us to the store, where we bought extra paper napkins ("I didn't know Kyle would be joining," as if she didn't have one extra napkin) and prawn sandwiches. Kyle offered to drive, but my mother insisted that it wouldn't be proper for him to get behind the wheel. "You're our guest," she reminded us while she was stuffing a chicken with stale bread. "Stanley can drive."

But I couldn't drive, of course, so due to her monstrous passive-aggression, we found ourselves sopping wet at Tesco, starving (we'd woken up in my cramped old bed at noon, sleeping through breakfast) and miserable.

"Are you having a happy birthday?" Kyle asked in the checkout queue.

"No unhappier than usual."

"I don't think your mother appreciated my quiche."

"Once she thinks on it, she'll realize it was a kind gesture."

"I hope she does."

I wondered why he cared. (My father still hadn't said one word to me.)

As much as British people are used to rain, being caught in it (even with an umbrella) is no one's ideal birthday. Wet slacks clung to Kyle's calves and thighs, his hair thickening and his nose and lips dripping. It went without saying that we weren't going do anything at my parents' place —stacked up like a dollhouse, privacy a delusion. I wished I had just declined my mother's invitation.

XXX

My sister brought five children to dinner. The eldest two no longer lived with her, and the youngest had a fever, so he stayed home with his father. Another was inside of her, I suppose, but perhaps being disinclined to breed, I hesitated to personify a fetus. This didn't stop my mother, however, who treated my sister like a reliquary and gave her a cushioned chair to sit on at the dining room table. I understood why my mother was like this — she was warped, I believe, by birthing me, an involved process that was so destructive it led to the removal of her reproductive organs. "You didn't want to come out," she liked to say to me when I was younger, although this annoyed me due to my aversion to personifying fetuses. Before I was born I didn't want anything. Now that I'd been born for 40 years, I wanted to crawl back to London (with Kyle, naturally) and pretend I didn't know these people.

We tended to be silent over dinner. My mother had made pies, chicken with leek and aged cheddar. She was a talented cook, and Kyle was delighted to eat English food cooked by a housewife in her own kitchen. He also insisted on talking all through dinner, which was something the Marsh family simply would not comply with. So he asked the children for all of their names and ages, what they liked best about school, what they wanted to be when they grew up.

"A mummy," said my niece Georgia, who was 10.

"Like a dead pharaoh?" he asked. "That's really clever. Sadly, I think you're out of luck."

"No, like a mother," she said. "I want to have babies and be a mummy."

"Oh. I see."

"What do you do?" asked 16-year-old Benno.

"I work in advertising," Kyle said.

"So you write adverts?"

"Not usually."

"Then what do you _do_?"

"I contract with companies that are seeking advertising strategies aimed at single men. I sort of sell the company to them based on an intuitive understanding of the market."

"He doesn't know what that means," my sister snapped at Kyle.

"I do so," Benno replied. "I'm not an idiot."

"I could explain it to him," Kyle insisted.

"Don't waste your time. You talk more now than you did when you were 20."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"It means as long as I've known you, you've never been able to shut it. Stop talking to my children, please."

"You don't know me at all!" Kyle said. "Your children are lovely. I want to get to know them."

"Why, what's the point?" Shelly asked. "You're not _part_ of this family. Stanley's barely here and you're just his bloody infatuation."

My mother managed to say, "Shelly, _please_."

"This whole thing is ridiculous," my sister said.

"Stanley, _say something_," Kyle pleaded.

I didn't really want to say anything. I learned when I was 15 that the less I said to my parents and sister, the more impressed they'd be with me, if only because they had no way to gauge me. But Kyle was looking at me with big, hurt eyes, unsure of how to defend himself.

"Is there a cake?" I asked. "Let's just move on to cake."

"But I'm not done with my food," said Georgia.

"Me neither," said Caian. (Caian was 7.)

"Or me, for that matter," said Kyle. "That wasn't helpful at all."

"I'm sorry! Look, Shells, shove off. Kyle's here because I want him here."

"Yes, but where the hell are _you_?"

"I'm right _here_!"

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," she said, gingerly getting up from the table. "It's been the longest day. Philomena's sick, you know, and it's not easy."

"I know," I said. "My friend Wendy's just had a little girl, I'm her godfather, I'm beginning to understand—"

"You don't understand! Just because you know some woman with a baby you think you have any _idea_ what I've gone through. It's sad, really, it's baffling. You queers, you — you just want to latch onto other people's families. Your poor friend, I bet she thinks she's doing you a favor. And _you_." She pointed a menacing finger at Kyle. "You stop talking to my children. Just because you can't make your own family doesn't mean you can just — just show up here and try to insinuate yourself in this one. Ugh, I'm disgusted. I have to go." Shelly disappeared into the kitchen.

Benno turned to Kyle. "You're a queer?" he asked.

"Yes, quite." A satisfied grin developed on Kyle's face, like he was pleased to have chased someone off from the dinner table just by being there. "Why, sweetheart, couldn't you tell?"

Benno said, "I see." Then he asked me, "Why'd you bring him to dinner?"

"Because I love him," I said, without hesitating.

"So, you're gay as well, then?"

I don't know if I'd ever exchanged more than a few short words with this boy, my nephew, but suddenly I realized that his stare was a bit too knowing. "Well, yes."

"No one ever told me."

"I am telling you now."

From the head of the table, my father had done nothing but glare at me throughout dinner. Now he balled up his paper napkin and stormed away from the table.

XXX

Kyle all but begged my mother to let him help her clean up, but she wouldn't hear of it. "Not necessary," she said, swiping a dishrag from his hands. "Just go — go sit down or something. Yes, you can go sit down. Read something. Make it an early night."

"Are you sure, Mrs. Marsh?"

"Positive," she insisted.

"Because I feel I've just made things so complicated, I want to help—"

"I have everything under control, dear, and Stanley will help me with the rest. Isn't that right?"

"Of course," I agreed.

It pained me to send Kyle upstairs, but he just said, "Well, I'll be reading the paper or whatever. I guess I'll be in bed when you're finished down here." Before he left, we kissed on the lips — closed-mouthed and careful, but the damage was done; I had never kissed anyone in front of my mother before, and when I turned around she looked deflated.

I picked up a plate with a half-finished slice of cake on it, blue fondant clinging to the china, but my mother took it from my hands before I could scrape it clean, saying, "Daddy wants to have a word with you."

"About dinner?"

My mother wiped the gleaming blade of a breadknife with the rag she'd confiscated from Kyle. "He's meant to speak with you for a while, I think. But that was stupid, Stanley. I think you know it was stupid."

"What was stupid?" I asked.

"Bringing Kyle to dinner."

"I didn't want to come here anyway."

"That hardly makes me feel good." She sniffed. "I never see you, and when you come you show up with someone else, acting like you don't want to be here."

"If you want to see me you're always welcome to come to the city. Bring some of Dad's rubbish and I'll shove it in the closet for you."

"I don't know what you do in the city. I don't think I want to know."

"Mum…"

Sighing, she untied the strings of her apron, folding it up and putting it away in a drawer. "I'll send him down," she said. She kissed my cheek, straining up on her tip-toes to reach it. "I'll finish cleaning when you've vacated. Happy birthday." She left.

XXX

My father pulled two bottles of Fuller's bitter from the pantry, and opened each with his back teeth — a kind of useless bravado, but I accepted the beer anyway, mostly because I was thirsty, although the idea of being sober when I spoke to him was rather unappealing as well. We sat down in the parlor, the BBC muted in the background, as it often was in my childhood home. He wasted no time on me, beginning with, "Happy birthday," the first thing he'd said to me in a day.

"Thanks," I replied.

"Of course." He narrowed his gaze and said, "I feel at this time it is no longer in my interest to support you financially," which was fair and direct, but jarring all the same. I had been expecting at the very least a tepid _how are you_.

"All right." Although somewhat unsettled by this information, I steeled myself as best I could, as I didn't want to appear demanding or act entitled, as such behavior would only keep me in this conversation longer, I was sure.

"When I was your age" — the sort of introductory remark no one wants to hear coming from a parent — "I held a professorship at this nation's most prestigious university."

"Which you got by dodging the service."

"Academic deferrals are perfectly legitimate."

"Of course." He was scowling at me, so I drank a mouthful of beer, swallowed, and said, "Please continue."

My father cleared his throat. "This was the 1950s, of course, and I hardly expect the culture of today to be what it was when I was young. This country's been through a lot — the '60s nearly killed us, and the '70s weren't much better. The academic community in general hasn't any love affair with Thatcher, but at least she has an agenda — which is more than I can say for _you_, Stanley."

"You're going to compare me to a conservative political doctrine? That hardly seems fair."

"You've been spending my money since you were 22 years old and you've got no life to speak of," he replied. "How is _that_ fair?"

"I do so have a life."

"Doing what? Son, what is it that you _do_?"

"I'm a writer."

"Oh, a writer." He set his beer down, and clasped his hands together. I could tell he had been composing this dialogue in his head for ages now, possibly years. "Tell me, what is it that you write?"

"Well." I put my beer down as well, on the carpet, and leaned in. "I've written two novels, for which I received two advances, the first of which I used to purchase my flat. I review plays and operas for the Independent. I'm writing a memoir—"

"A memoir? Like an autobiography?"

"Well, something like that, less comprehensive and more reflective, something with a kind of narrative structure I hope."

"But son, what are you going to _write_ about? You've never _done_ anything."

This enraged me, but I tried to keep calm, swallowing back my anger and clenching my fists. "I've done loads of things, perhaps not things you'd directly approve of—"

He cut me off: "When _I_ was your age, I had a wife and two children. A respectable existence."

"I don't know what that has to do with giving me money," I said, although I knew exactly what it had to do with it, and where this conversation was going.

"It has to do with it, all right, in that I've got eight, soon to be _nine_ grandchildren, and not one of them is yours. If I'm going to dole out funding to my progeny, it seems such investments are wasted on you. How does that make you feel?"

"It doesn't make me feel anything, because I don't want children. It doesn't bother me."

"Godammit!" He slammed his hand down on the side table between us, hard enough to rattle the lamp and the half-empty bottle of beer that sat upon it. "This has gone far enough! You think your generation invented homosexuality? I've read Plato. You _didn't_. Fuck as many blokes as you feel is necessary. It's been done before. But you're 40, for god sakes. You have to find a wife at some point. And have _children_."

This was probably the frankest thing my father had ever said to me, and it utterly baffled me. "You — you're not disgusted by homosexuality?"

"Of course I am! What proper Englishman isn't?"

"I'm not," I said. "Obviously."

"Well, you should be! What the bloody hell is wrong with you? How _dare_ you bring that man into my house?"

"I've known Kyle for ages. He's my oldest friend."

"It's one thing to fuck men, don't you understand? It's horrid, but for some it's just necessary, I understand. But for Christ's sake, Stanley, you have to maintain the proper kind of _shame_ about it!"

"I'm sorry, I don't quite understand what it is that you're implying." Although I did; I just wanted to hear him say it to me, direct as possible.

"I'm not _implying_ anything! I'm outright saying you need to stop flaunting this ridiculous lifestyle, get a real job, find a woman, and reproduce! Move out of that fucking warehouse you call a flat and move to the suburbs! You can fuck as many men as you want, but you have to do it under the proper conditions! Society is a code, don't you understand? We all have vices, some more than others, but the propriety of life demands that we indulge each other and act like human beings. This pretention of yours, writing things and living in squalor — it's pathetic. If homosexuality is your vice and you need to indulge it, I suppose there's little I can do about it—"

I felt the immediate need to interrupt him. "I'm sorry," I repeated, sorrier for him than for myself. "You're quite deluded."

"I'm _deluded_? You're a spoiled little wastrel and I won't indulge your frivolity any longer!"

By this point we were really just shouting at each other, albeit in a soundly articulate and rational way. So I yelled back, "Fuck you and go straight to hell!"

"I'll never give you another penny!"

"I don't want your fucking money!" I left my beer on the floor and my father glaring at me like he'd just watched me murder someone.

Upstairs, Kyle was sitting on the bed with his legs crossed, reading the Mirror. When I slammed the door, he looked up at me. "What's all that shouting about?"

I pushed him down into the mattress with brute force and climbed on top of him, my teeth against his jaw and my hands in his hair, then around his waist, and I began to unbuckle his belt. He seemed to want it, his lips answering mine as our tongues began to meet, dropping the paper onto the floor. But by the time I had his pants off, he pulled away and said, in a breathless gasp, "Jesus, Stanley, really? What happened down there?"

"What?" I was unfastening my own buttons now, desperate to be rid of my shirt.

"In your childhood bedroom? Aren't you too old for this kind of rebellion? I mean, your parents are going to hear _all_ of this."

"I hope they do." Free of my undershirt, I began to help Kyle out of his. "They need to hear."

"I can't believe you'll get off on this kind of puerile thing." He reached up from the mattress to assess my erection through my slacks. "Mmm, I see."

"I'll get off on _you_," I said, shifting my hips in his grasp.

"I hope you'll get off _in_ me, rather." Kyle tugged at my pants, and grasped my thighs while I straddled him. "You're very good, you know. I don't think they appreciate it. I hope you'll tell me what you were arguing about."

"Sure." I paused to spit into my palm, too impatient for this to waste any time looking around for lotion or its more audacious relative, shortening — which I knew my mother would have in the pantry, but she was really an innocent bystander to all of this. After slicking my fingers through a palm full of saliva, I thrust them inside of Kyle. "How should we do this?" I asked, all the while moving in and out of him in a brisk, officious rhythm. "I want to do it in some way that's going to produce a lot of noise."

"You mean you want _me_ to make a lot of noise? Oh — yes, that's good, more with that spot, Stanley." I obliged, forcing him to inch his legs farther apart, grab his own cock and begin stroking it — something he was rarely wont to do, for some reason. "Face down, I suppose."

"I don't know if they'll hear well enough. I could force you on your hands and knees."

"Or missionary. Oh, _fuck_, you are good, _you are really good at this_."

"You're the one servicing yourself, darling. We could go on our sides, back-to-front—"

"I like missionary. I'd like to see you, you know, you're nice to look at."

I had never really thought about how vocal sex could be. Kyle was a talker — that is, generally while fucking we kept an odd stream of conversation going, usually about the fucking in progress. Coming of age in boarding schools and at Oxford, one learned to keep his mouth shut, to avoid calling attention to himself. Screaming, crying — these things would surely have called unwarranted attention to the act that elicited them.

So we weren't in practice for this sort of thing, and I imagine he felt as awkward as I did, pounding against him with such force that the bed slammed against the wall, and that striated chunk of Colorado rock fell off the bookcase. It felt liberating to revel in the idea that my father could hear me fucking. When Kyle shouted, "I'm coming" it made me laugh — not _at _him, but there was a kind of uncontrollable joy that resulted from being so defiant.

As we lay together, cramped into my tiny old bed, Kyle turned to me and asked, "What were you shouting about down there, with your father?"

There was really no reason not to tell him. "Two things, really. The subtext, I should think, is that he cannot stand the idea that I haven't got a normal life — what he perceives to be normal, anyhow. He's such an awkward man, I don't believe it's occurred to him until now to actually address it, have a conversation with me about it. We never talk to each other, you know. I've always been convinced when he found out, he'd meant to beat me — perhaps what subdued him was the idea that I would settle into a kind of double life, or that perhaps I could be cowed by society. But we know that's not true, of course."

"Oh, Stanley." Kyle sighed, and kissed me on the cheek, a gesture he meant to be reassuring — and it was, but only just. "I'm sorry your father's a prig."

"I shouldn't care." Perhaps I didn't care. I didn't feel hurt of any kind — just righteous anger. "Anyway, he's cutting me off. That's the gist of it."

This made Kyle sit straight up in bed, put his hands on my chest, and look into my eyes. "I've a wonderful idea," he said. "You should move in with me."

"Excuse me?"

"Yes, yes — it's a fabulous idea. Move in with me, dear, and I'll take care of you. We can sell your flat, you'll have no expenses. Let's get married! It'll be fun."

"Oh, that'll please my parents, go on and get married _to a man_, of_ course_."

"Why do you need to please them?"

I pulled his hands away and sat up next to him, really wishing I hadn't left that half of a Fuller's downstairs. "Obviously I don't need to please them. I'm doing all right now, darling. I make a bit from the Independent; I can try to get an advance on whatever it is that I'm trying to write…"

"It's not just about money. This nomadic lifestyle exhausts me. Now you are 40—"

"And _you'll_ be 40 come May, darling."

"—and it's time to stop playing around."

Rolling my eyes, I said, "I love you, Kyle, but I'm not going to upend my life right now."

"Well, do you think we will go on like this indefinitely, or—"

"I think we could move in together some day." I'd never even thought about it. We'd shared a flat off the King's Road in the later 1960s, before I'd bought my place. It was dirty and neither of us knew anything about living out of the dorms, but we learned together, and it had worked out all right. It hadn't occurred to me, though, that anything was lacking in our current modus operandi. Yet Kyle seemed distressed.

"When will that day be?"

"I don't know."

"Soon?"

"_I don't know_."

"Right." Kyle climbed over my legs and slipped off the bed. "If you'll excuse me, I'd better go wash your come out of my ass lest I stain the sheets or something."

By the next morning, both of us were in good spirits again, if only to get the hell out of Oxford. My mother drove us to the train station in complete silence, kissing me on the cheek as I got out of the car. Kyle came around to the driver's side and knocked on her window. She lowered it, just a bit, and he said, "Thank you for having me, Mrs. Marsh."

She cleared her throat. "Thank you for the quiche."

Kyle beamed. "Any time."

We took two seats facing backward on the train, as it was quite packed for a Sunday and there were no tables available. Kyle asked for a soda, and I went to get him a Coca-Cola from the snack car. When I returned, there was an envelope on my chair.

"What's this?" I asked, handing him the can.

"I haven't given you a birthday gift yet," he said. "Everyone likes gifts, Stanley. Don't pretend you don't want it. You haven't even opened it yet. Go on."

"Is it money? I don't want money."

"You'd better hope I'm more creative that _that_," he said. He looked so weary. Not unhappy, just exhausted. After a long week at work, I'd forced him into an unpleasant Saturday with my parents and sister. The least I could do was oblige.

When I opened the envelope, I found a long, hand-written note. It began, _Dear Stanley: On the occasion of your fortieth birthday, it seems fitting to me that I give you something more substantial than a princess phone. I hope you'll understand _— I stopped reading, and pulled at a paperclip holding the letter to two airline tickets, Heathrow to Newark. I shuffled back a page and found an itinerary.

"You're taking me to New York?"

"Yes." Kyle rested his head against the window, and snapped open his can of soda. "In June, as you can see."

"I can see." I folded the tickets, the note, and the itinerary back into the envelope, tucking it into my pocket. "Well, darling. This is—"

"Unexpected?"

"I was going to say 'lovely.' "

Kyle turned to me, swallowing a mouthful of Coke, squeezing the can between his thighs. (I wondered if it wasn't going to spill; it didn't.) "You'll really like it there. June is such a nice time, before it gets too hot. I know people say it's a filthy place but some of the best times I've had — the river at midnight, late spring, these dilapidated old piers with young men hanging from the rafters. Artists, too, it's — it feels like a community or something. Like a little village in a great big city. Like Soho, but less cramped. My cousin Kyle lives in Connecticut, you know, but he's got a place — a little pied-a-terre, across the street from the park. On the West Side. You'll really love it. The taxis are all yellow."

"Well, I don't know what to say."

"Say 'thank you.' "

"_Thank you_."

He grabbed my hand, and squeezed it. "I'm so glad to be away from your family. Just us again."

I was glad too.

XXX

Motherhood weighed heavily on Wendy Testaburger-Williams, the Right Hon. The Viscountess Black. When I was back from Oxfordshire, she had me to tea, despite my protestation that she must have better things to do. There were chicken sandwiches, and the baby cried incessantly. It was quite a contrast.

"I don't know how to get her to stop it." Wendy was exasperated, bouncing Willa in her arms, shushing the baby abstractly, as if she could tell her mother was distressed. "Token's no help, no help at all."

"I'm sure he's just working—"

"I don't care what he's doing! Working, racquetball, fucking Craig — this baby is ruining my life! I've rescheduled a board meeting _three times_ already. My mother can take her but only so often. She wants to get back to the country and I suppose I don't blame her. She already had a baby. But that's not the most infuriating thing!" Wendy leaned in to whisper to me, over the table and the tea tray, the wailing infant and my plate of half-eaten sandwiches. "_The most infuriating thing is that he keeps insisting that we do it again_."

"Do what again?" I asked. "Fuck? You should be so lucky."

"No, not _fuck. _I'd fuck that man six ways to Sunday if he wanted it. He spends all his time with Craig and Clyde lately. Maybe he's fucking _them_. I don't know. Besides, wouldn't _you_ know?"

"I _don't_ know. The last time I saw Token was in hospital."

"Why, was something wrong?"

"No. _You_ had had a baby."

"Right." She blushed, sticking her fingers in Willa's mouth to get the baby to stop howling. "It's not that I'd forgotten, but — well, I suppose it seems so long ago. Sorry. I've been distracted lately. And I'm just so bloody tired."

"That's understandable. Wendy, you don't even have to invite me to tea."

"But I want to. I don't quite know how to explain this, Stanley, but — please don't think I'm insane when I say this." She swallowed in between her words, banishing nervousness. "I just feel different now. Not like myself, you know. Like someone is stifling me."

"I do think this is a normal reaction to parenthood. Who is stifling you?"

"I don't know." Wendy sighed and pulled her fingers from the baby's mouth now that she had quieted somewhat. "Token, probably. He — how do I even say this? It's going to sound so stupid. He's been — well, I suppose the right word is _encouraging_ me — to do it again, to have another baby. The entire rigorous process, all over again. I tell him I'm exhausted, I can barely sleep and I don't know where I am half of the time—"

"_Wends_." I got up and went over to her, knelt by her side. "You don't have to do anything you don't want to do."

"But that's the ridiculous part. He's not being unreasonable. This is something that, in theory, I _should want to do_. It's not a judgment on Willa, he loves Willa, but Willa can't hold an earldom in her own right."

"I'm sympathetic to the idea, believe me."

"It's my sole duty in life, and I can't even manage it."

"He's the one with the chromosomes, you know," I reminded her. "So technically, this is Token's shortcoming."

"Well, he's trying to rectify it! I just don't think I want another baby."

"Then don't have one."

"Oh, you know it isn't up to me. Perhaps if I waited a bit, maybe a year, I'd be more enthusiastic. But it took so long to work last time, and I'm not the ideal age for breeding, really."

"I don't know. My sister's having children well into her 40s. You could go on indefinitely." Settling into a cross-legged position, I put my chin in my hands and my elbows on my thighs so I could look up at her. From the floor, she looked positively Mannerist holding the baby. "Do you know, Kyle's asked me to move in with him?"

"No, I didn't know that. When did he ask you this?"

"Oxford."

She put the last bite of a scone in her mouth and chewed it while he hummed to herself. "I don't think that's a half-bad idea. His flat is _gorgeous_, Stanly. Pedestrian, but gorgeous. He's got such nice rugs. I'd kill for rugs like that."

"Weren't your rugs a gift from the viceroy of India?"

"Hmm, yes. To Token's great-grandfather, years ago. So they aren't really mine, you understand. The house isn't mine, the rugs aren't mine, Willa's not really mine…"

"Don't be so caustic."

"I'm not caustic! It's true. You're lucky you're gay. There are no social institutions dictating the terms of your marriage. Don't you want to move in with him?"

"Not particularly." It surprised me how quickly I said it, but while Wendy shifted her hold on the baby, I thought about how much I enjoyed my life. Kyle was there when I needed him, when I wanted him. For the most part our sex life was electric, consistent and satisfying. I had no inclination to risk heterosexual complacency now. Besides, Kyle hadn't asked again.

XXX

To shake her creeping sense of displacement, Wendy put together a dinner party of five couples, herself and Token included. Convincing Kyle to come with me was not exactly easy. "Who's going to be there?" he asked. "I've been exhausted lately. If it's going to be people I dislike I don't see the point in attending."

"Oh, you know — Wendy and Token, Bebe and Jason—"

"I don't know them."

"—_Lord and Lady McHugh_ — look, Kyle, it isn't _important_. Just come along."

"Why? Is Clyde going to be there?"

I had no idea. I hadn't seen him in months. Possibly a year. We hadn't gone out since before my birthday, choosing to drink at Kyle's flat on Saturday evenings instead of traveling en masse to Camp. Whichever circles old Clyde was traveling in, he'd escaped my periphery. But I _knew_ Craig would be there, probably with Tweek; Token and Craig were so close that I sometimes wondered if they hadn't fallen in love at some point, and let conventional wisdom keep them apart. (The one time I had suggested this to Wendy, she laughed it off: "You're confusing your feelings for Kyle with other men's feelings for their best mates," she said. "Token and _Craig_? It's strictly platonic.")

"Maybe Clyde will be there," I said. "But maybe he won't be. If he is, wouldn't you like to have the satisfaction of rubbing it in his face?"

"What am I rubbing in his face?"

"That you're happy."

"Oh. Well, I suppose I am."

Clyde was there, all right, and he was not there alone. He had a date, a short girl named Rebecca whom he fondly called 'Red.' As in, "Get me a glass of the Chateau Latour, Red," or, "Tell them what I got you for your birthday, Red."

It turned out that for Rebecca's birthday, Clyde had gotten her breast implants. She announced this over the salad course. (Fennel, magenta beets, stilton crumbles, citrus vinaigrette.) Then Clyde erupted into a coughing fit. His skin was so sallow, like the shade of Sellotape. He looked tired, but he wouldn't cease fidgeting, sitting on his fingers and rocking back and forth. He hardly ate a bite the entire meal. The girl looked healthy, almost glowing — the neon blue of her eye shadow clashed with her hair; she had big, thick applications of pencil under the lids of her eyes, on the waterline. Her makeup was oppressive, painted on. I wanted to say something, but that would have been cruel. Was Clyde actually sleeping with her? The way he welcomed her touch made it seem possible.

Craig scolded him: "You are trying my patience, Donovan. No one wants to hear about breast implants at the dinner table. And for the last time, do something about that cough."

"Oh, Your Grace — cleavage isn't to your liking?" Kyle asked. "That's right, I'd forgotten. Or if you miss it, maybe Tweek should get some."

"Jesus! I don't _want_ any!"

"I've been thinking of getting some," Bebe suggested. "But of course, that would just be indecent — mine are so big already."

"Quite," Jason added. Then he guffawed at his own joke. Clyde forced himself to laugh along, looking about as uncomfortable as everyone else felt.

Wendy tried to temper the conversation by asking Rebecca what she did.

"I'm a glamour model — you know, Page Three, all that. Calendars, even." She beamed at this, as if it were the pinnacle of human accomplishment. I saw Token shudder. Kyle had to bite his lip to keep from laughing.

"And where did you meet Clyde?"

"He got me a passport, actually—"

Clyde felt it necessary to interrupt. "She was invited to a shoot in Saint-Tropez and needed it expedited—"

Now Bebe felt the need to interrupt Clyde. "We have a home in Saint-Tropez! It's just breathtaking, wouldn't you say? I mean the summers—"

And now Jason interrupted Bebe. "Oh, but the tourists are just making it _oppressive_. And the taxes — don't get my started. Four homes, you know — who needs it?"

"Well, I didn't have time to really _see_ anything," Red explained. "You know how it is. _Working_."

"Hardly!" Jason exclaimed. "Who works anymore? I mean, _really_." The lack of irony in his voice was confusing. I'd never met anyone so self-unaware in my life.

"I work," said Token.

For a moment, the entire table was silent. Then Craig said, "But, you don't … _have_ to," as if the idea that a rich man might labor, on his own volition, was a totally novel idea for him.

"I think I have to," Token said, "because I should go mad if I didn't. Everyone needs a sense of purpose."

"Being fabulous is good purpose," said Kyle. "I work, obviously, so that I can have nice things. And don't forget the numbers of people who would like to work and can't find any. My parents always taught me that affluent people should work to take care of those who can't."

"That's ridiculous," Craig spat, recoiling from Kyle. (They were seated next to each other — a stupid decision on Wendy's part, but then, it wasn't as if anyone at the table was really his friend.) "Mrs. Thatcher has done _astounding_ things for this country. If everyone who worked hard just, just — _squandered_ their funds away indulging indolent paupers, no one would do anything. The bloody country would collapse. Irish orphans begging on every damn corner. Total anarchy."

"What about you?" I asked. "You didn't work for any of your money."

"I work bloody hard to support a system that has benefitted all of _you_. I inherited what I have, but I've never forgotten for a day that a title is a responsibility and a God-given right, not a license to wallow."

"Britain is the premier welfare state!" Kyle cried. "It's the foundational tenet of the entire society! There is such a thing as socialist policies without communist political agenda."

"Well, _finally_ someone is changing that."

Wendy put her head in her hands, elbows on the table. "I had really hoped we wouldn't venture into politics."

"It isn't your fault, dear." Bebe put a reassuring hand on Wendy's back. "Some people just can't help it." She glared nastily at Kyle.

"This is why I stay out of it," I said. "You can't have a polite society when power is parceled out in such limited quantities.

"I still think it's despicable," Kyle said. "Your district went to a third-party in '83! Why can't you just vote Labor and be done with it?"

"People are disenfranchised," I replied. "They're not going to vote for some minority party in a flawed system."

"People are disenfranchised because _you_ don't vote. Let me tell you something, Stanley — _you_ are disenfranchised."

"Yes, by virtue of living in a working-class constituency, feeling alienated by a backward parliamentary system—"

Kyle rolled his eyes. "No, by virtue of being homosexual."

As Kyle peered down his nose at me with a look of total satisfaction, Jason stood up. "I, er — better call home. Sitter — nanny — you know, something—" He got up and fled the dining room.

Kyle continued: "Thatcher's Tory government is pushing an agenda that outlaws the _promotion_ of homosexuality. Slowly. It will come up for a vote _someday_, I'm sure. Maybe not in 1986 — maybe in 1987. How does that make you feel, Craig — _Your Grace_? What if you had to vote on that?"

Craig's face turned sour, like someone had punched him in the stomach, held something spoilt under his nose. Slowly, he said, "I might abstain. It would probably pass without me. I don't even know if something like that would come up—"

"It will," said Kyle. "Mark my words, it will come."

"What kind of rubbish is your sanctimonious Liberal American mother telling you?" Craig asked.

"She isn't telling me a thing. I read the papers." Kyle shook his head. "Perhaps she tells me just a bit. If your government stays in power, we're headed for a culture war in this country. Thatcher will be the end of homosexuality in Britain, I promise you."

"Or…" Clyde had apparently been paying attention to this conversation. Coughing into his hands, he began to croak out, "…or they'll all die off like — like the Americans…" He began laughing and coughing at the same, into the crook of his arm. Like a good escort, Rebecca made herself laugh along with him.

I looked to Kyle, who shrugged. Later we figured Clyde must have been quite drunk, because what he said wasn't really funny.

XXX

The week before Christmas, Wendy called to ask us to dinner after the new year — not at her home, but at a club she and Token had both recently joined. "Perhaps you and Kyle could join, wouldn't that be interesting?" she asked on the telephone. "I mean, it's hardly the best meal you'll have in your life, but the room is to die for, Stanley, utterly to die for."

"Excuse me," I had replied. "You gave a dinner party two weeks ago and now you are planning a couples' evening out?"

"What are you implying?"

"Well," I said slowly, careful not to seem judgmental. "Wouldn't you prefer to spend the evening with your new daughter?"

She laughed. "I see her all day long. My mother would honestly relish the chance to sit with the baby all evening. Friday evening at 7, the 3rd, is that okay? I think Token would rather put his eyes out than have another meal with Bebe and Jason. You boys—" Kyle and I being the boys "—are such an interesting change of pace. What do you say?"

I had to think for a moment. Clubs, frankly, made me uncomfortable; I had spent a few afternoons with Token at White's around the time we were finishing at university. The feeling of stuffy old men gawking at two boys put me on edge and I don't think it made Token any less unsettled. Thankfully, shortly before Token and I stopped seeing each other, he dropped his membership at White's, citing its conservative nature as stifling, although his father remained a member. (And, curiously, so did Craig.) I could only imagine being stared at through dinner as other patrons tried to divine what Kyle and I were doing there. That said, Kyle did love anything that reeked of Establishment Britain, and felt best about himself when hobnobbing with anyone he considered important. Figuring that this would delight him, I decided it couldn't possibly hurt.

"Sure," I agreed. "We'll see you for dinner at your silly club."

"It's hardly silly!" Wendy protested. "It's a historic establishment! One of the finest art deco confections in London! Rivals the Senate House!"

"Ugh." I shuddered, thinking of its brutal exterior. "_Senate House_."

"Well, you'll see. Oh, Token will be so happy you've agreed!"

I never caught wind of Token's reaction, but Kyle was all too happy. "I've never been to a club!" he exclaimed when I invited him. "Is there a dress code? Perhaps I should buy a new outfit. What are you going to wear?" This was on a Monday at the Bucky. Kyle seemed more tired than usual, but he had been working hard on seducing business from someone from American Express for whatever reason, staying up quite late to write out lists of statistics, and I felt bad that he was feeling the repercussions from this.

"Well, I didn't _think_ about it," I replied, to the question about dress. "What I always wear, I suppose," what I always wore being jeans and a T-shirt, which I was well aware was very much inappropriate attire but was too annoyed to admit to knowing this.

"Oh, you cannot be so silly. I'll come by after work and find you a nice outfit. I'll take you to a tailor if I have to. Or we could shop. What if I bought you something nice for Christmas? You act like you're not prepared for being 40 _at all._" Despite the fact he was obviously exhausted, Kyle's eyes lit up and for a moment his delight at having an excuse to do something indispensable and spousal was quite apparent. Then he coughed into his hands. "All afternoon I fantasized about this evening. Now I'm utterly exhausted."

"We can have sex tomorrow," I consoled him, although on the inside I felt disappointed, having looked forward to that as well. "I suppose we can do it tomorrow, if that suits you."

"Ah, you wanted me. Still. I'm glad." He grinned at me. "Thank you for being accommodating. I'm sorry — I have no appetite tonight. Of any variety."

"Darling, I haven't stopped wanting you in 20 years." I finished the drink I was nursing, an 18-year Glenlivet I'd decided to indulge in for whatever reason. "Besides, I suppose there is always tomorrow."

"There is always the rest of our lives," Kyle replied.

"Yes," I agreed. "So there is."

Around this time, as it was approaching Christmas, I asked Kyle if he would come with me to Oxford to celebrate with my family. Neither Kyle nor I gave any credence to the idea of the messianic savior, but I had a cultural marker on me that made it impossible to pretend the holiday wasn't happening. Kyle, on the other hand, had never once so much as stuffed a stocking. (Not a double-entendre.) When I had first met him, it shocked me that he did not celebrate Christmas; of course, I understood that Jews were like this, but having never come across one my thoughts on Jewish devotion were quite academic. Nevertheless, I had gotten used to this. Christmas was still something I felt I had to go home to do with my family, and as my definition of family had expanded to include Kyle, I wanted him there.

But Kyle really did not want to be there. He never had, and in the past had declined politely, citing work or his parents or just about anything he could dream up. Not this time: "God, _no_. Why would you even want me there? Why do you even want to be there?"

I decided to act as if it were absurd to even ask this. "Well, it's the Marsh family tradition, you know, and being that you are the closest thing I have to a wife, I think you'd better come with." I said this in the most sarcastic tone I could muster. Although I wasn't exactly clear what I was trying to express here, I thought it sounded nice.

But it just offended him. "After that marvelous birthday debacle I'm shocked you would even consider asking! And since when am I your wife?"

"Christ, darling, I was joking?"

"You won't even _move in_ with me and you expect me to celebrate all your _goyishe_ holidays?

I didn't know what _goyishe_ was, but it sounded pretty dismal when he said it. So I said, "Well, you don't have to _celebrate_, or even pretend you're happy to be there. But please, I'd really like you to be there."

"The last thing I want to do is be trapped in a house with your mother, your father, your _sister_, her husband, and eight children. Nine children? Has your sister had that baby yet?" he asked.

"Yes, around Halloween." My mother had called to inform me that Shelly had delivered a little boy, which might have been exciting if it weren't my fifth nephew or something. Having lost count a long time ago, and feeling fairly detached from the entire situation, I simply sent her a very generic card with a check inside for 100 pounds. I did feel bad that things had become so rote, but my sister and I were never friends, and frankly, nine children is really a lot for anyone, Catholic or no. At least, nine children was a lot for a 44-year-old woman in 1985. We had not spoken since my birthday; she had not sent a thank-you note.

"Well, is there going to be a baptism?" Kyle asked. "Or was it already baptized?

"He has not been baptized. I suppose someone will inform me, whenever it's happening, but no, generally you wait a bit."

"Well, what happens if he dies, god forbid, the little boy? Doesn't he need to be baptized to get into heaven?"

"I don't know," I admitted. "I'm not convinced that's how Christianity works."

"I am convinced that is exactly how it works."

"Well, thank god we are living at the dawn of the third millennium," I said. "Very low infant mortality rates."

"My point stands. I am not coming to Christmas. Not now, not ever. I do not celebrate Christmas. I do not accept Jesus Christ. I do not believe there is anything affirming about felling a tree. I will listen to Her Majesty's address because I think that is a matter of national pride, but that is the extent of it. You can be here with me and we can listen to it together, and I'm sure it'll be worth your while corporally, but if you expect me to get on a train and go play docile with 13 people who think me extraneous and outright loathe me, you're going to have to free yourself of that idea. Because, you know, I am not your _wife _— close though it may be."

"But I do want you to come," I repeated. "My family will get used to it if you come with to things like Christmas. People are animals — if you train us, we learn. Just come to Christmas with me—"

"I'd rather stay here, get work done, and eat Chinese food with my parents. I'll spend some time with Miss B, maybe — although who knows, she may be going with Dougie. But have a nice Christmas, and I'll see you when you get back."

As I sat on the train alone with children running up and down the aisles, my face pressed to chilled glass panes, it occurred to me that I was angry, and I wanted him there.

Christmas with my family was awkward and alienating. I was there for two long nights, and the idea of playing nursemaid to someone else's children began to grate on me. They asked me unfortunate questions, like, "Where is that man you came with last time?"

And I had to tell them, "Well, he didn't want to come."

"Is he with his own family?" Georgia asked.

"He may be, but Kyle doesn't celebrate Christmas."

"Why?"

"Well, he isn't a Christian."

She looked up at me with big, stupid eyes, this girl of 10 years old, my sister's child. "I don't understand," she whispered.

"Well, sweetheart," I said, "I expect you never shall."

Benno cornered me in the kitchen pantry on Christmas morning to ask where Kyle was as well. "He doesn't celebrate Christmas," I told him. "And even if he did, he _has_ got his own family, to your mother's ignorance."

"That's a shame." My nephew shook his head. "He's hot."

I felt for this boy, I really did, and yet the insolent kind of leer that accompanied this statement both piqued a territorial jealousy in me and made me feel ill. "Thank you," I said, managing the grab the can of beer I wanted before escaping. "I think so, too."

On the train ride home, I was quite aware that I no longer felt a viable participant in my own family. Returning to London at nightfall on a late December night, my heart warmed at the idea of running to Kyle's flat, falling into bed with him, and never letting him go.

XXX

After the traumas of Willa's birth, Oxford, and that awkward dinner party, I was relieved to have a quiet and informal New Year's. We had dinner out with Eric, Kenny, Butters, and Dougie. I didn't really like Dougie — he was too eager, too earnest. He was head over heels for Miss B, went to visit her at work all the time, sent her meaningless gifts like stuffed animals in the post. I had no idea if they were sleeping together, but Butters had nobody else to bring to dinner anyway. We were done by 10 p.m., after which we left them and went back to Kyle's flat and listened to a program on the wireless. Kyle produced a baggie of cocaine and carefully spilled some out onto the surface of his coffee table book on Poiret, pushing disparate clumps into long spindles with the open flap of a matchbook. Each was graceful and narrow, like his fingers. I didn't usually have any cocaine, but it was New Year's Eve, and I felt partial. First I asked him where he gotten it.

"From Eric," he said, wiping back and forth across his nostrils with the back of one poised wrist. "He's loaded down with it, constantly. Like a walking 1920s apothecary."

"It's doing him well, I suppose. He's lost about an entire small child's worth of weight."

"Sad that no matter how thin he becomes, I'll always think of him as obese. Do you think I should go on coke binges more often? To lose weight, I mean."

"I'll forgive you saying that because you're high."

We shared a split of pink champagne, snogging on the couch until dawn, an endless, breathless march toward nothing in particular. On New Years' Day we were exhausted, and didn't get out of bed until it was already dark out, the sky a halting violet over Hyde Park, which we couldn't quite make out from Kyle's balcony.

Kyle had the rest of the week off, though, so the next day he took me to Harvey Nichols and bought me a really nice sport coat with corduroy trousers and a new pair of shoes. "You look so handsome," he said, tugging the coat down by the hem. "Maybe you should dress like this every day."

"I look like a ponce and I feel like a liar."

"Why? Because you look gorgeous?" He snaked a hand around to the front of my slacks, groping me through the fabric. He pressed his lips to my right ear and said, "I've been gorging myself this whole Christmas season, but I think a little bit more won't hurt. Will it?"

"Certainly not," I agreed, nodding at this attention. It had been a long while since I'd last engaged in sex in public, and the thrill of possibly getting caught was not as satisfying as the idea that I could take what I wanted wherever I wanted it. Like I'd done at my parents' house, I got off a bit on the notion that I could impose my will on everyone — not just Kyle, whom I was fucking, but the idea of anyone who came into the space we were inhabiting. Marking the dressing room, so to speak — although Kyle came rather obediently into my hand, sparing us the awkwardness of having to improvise a clean up.

Later, though, when I was at home in front of the typewriter with Kyle asleep upstairs in my bed, paper bags of new clothing sitting at my feet, I felt hopeless. Not about the sex, of course — that was all well and good. I didn't like expensive clothes for no reason; I didn't like private clubs; I didn't like that Kyle was buying these things for me. For a moment, I felt I should fake illness and get out of going. But then I remembered how much Kyle wanted to go, and how much Wendy was looking forward to it. I stopped writing for the night, and climbed into bed with Kyle. He was sweating in his sleep, so hot I could barely hold him. Kissing his bare shoulder, I rolled onto my back and stared at the ceiling until I fell asleep.

XXX

Kyle was supposed to meet me at my flat after running some errands so we could get dressed and take a cab to dinner together. (Kyle insisted. He felt arriving at a distinguished London social institution by Tube was beneath us, undignified.) When he came over, he rang the bell, which was unusual. He had a key to my flat and generally used it. When I got the door for him, looked awful. I leaned in to kiss him, but he turned his head away and my lips caught his hair. "Don't want you to catch whatever I've got," he explained, pulling his coat off and leaving draped over the back of the sofa.

"Well, what've you got?" I asked, already pouring him a glass of sherry.

"Oh, I don't know. I just feel the most acute fatigue. Everything's been a bit off."

I handed him his sherry. "Did you see a doctor?"

"No. What for?"

"Isn't that what sick people generally do?"

He shuddered, shuffling over to the couch and hunching over, arms crossed, as he sat. "I'll be fine," he said. "Just have to get to dinner. That's all."

"You were burning up last night," I said. "Are you sure you don't want to see a doctor quickly? Before the clinics close?" It was about 3 p.m. Dinner was at 7. "Just to make sure."

"I don't want to see a doctor. I'm fine!" he snapped. Then he rose, shaking his head. "I'm sorry, I don't feel my best. Obviously. Not clinic-bad, just … take-it-easy bad. Do you mind if I get in bed for a while?"

"Not at all. Go ahead." I leaned in to kiss him.

He stopped me. "Sick, remember?" He patted me on the shoulder, and went upstairs. "Wake me when it's time to go," was the last thing he said.

I sat down at the typewriter, ready to dive into my latest manuscript. For some months, I'd been working on completing a third book, a memoir this time, less pornographic than my previous attempts. I hardly felt that anyone wanted to read about my early life, yet I felt compelled to compose it — there was something precocious and odd about growing up as I did, a queer 15-year-old loner in Oxford in 1961, combating a family so severely Catholic my own father actually went to lengths to have me excommunicated _tolerandus_, which didn't take if only for the reason that the priests of our local parish hadn't the authority, and the archdiocese hadn't the time to worry themselves over one deviant non-believer. In any case, that didn't come down until I was 20, and I couldn't say it ruptured my relationship with my father because I really never had one to speak of. He'd given me two things in my entire life up to that point: a rock and a dog. I had loved the dog, didn't much care about the rock, and yet I felt I had a story to tell about waking up on a Sunday morning covered in the byproduct of nocturnal emissions and thinking to myself, "I am not getting out of bed today. I will never go back to church. Those people just hate me, or would if they knew me," which they didn't. About four years later, I met Kyle, and while it would be a book no one else wanted to read, I was determined to write it.

So with Kyle feeling unwell, I went downstairs and typed for some time, a long passage about becoming an uncle at 13, which forced me to consider in turn that my eldest nephew had to be approaching 27 at this point. There had been a time when I had wanted to care about these things, but that time was far past.

After filling up several pages with utter nonsense, I went back upstairs. It was nearing 6 p.m. Kyle was dozing, but looking quite pale. I sat down with him on the bed, and he stirred, mumbling into the sheets, "So tired."

"You've been sleeping since you got here," I said.

"A bit longer," he replied. "Sleeping."

"I'm going to call Wendy and postpone dinner."

This caught his attention. "I want to go."

"You're too sick to go out to dinner."

"I really feel awful," he conceded. "What time—?"

"It's 6, roughly." I kissed him behind his ear. "I'll go downstairs and ring Wendy" — who wasn't exactly thrilled to receive my cancellation.

"You _cannot_ just do this," she moaned. "We were so looking forward to it!"

"Well, Kyle's sick, you know," I said. "He's been sleeping for two hours. He's not going anywhere."

"Why don't you come alone?" she suggested.

"I'm not going to leave him here. I'm going to take care of him, you know." I was trying, and failing, to act as though this prospect didn't excite me just a little bit. Granted, it would be best if Kyle _weren't_ sick, but I was definitely looking forward to making him feel better, if I could. And I hadn't wanted to go out to dinner anyhow.

"Oh, well aren't you just the best boyfriend, mon cher," she said, in a way that told me she resented it. "I _so_ wanted to go out with you. I have to get out."

"Spend some time with your baby," I said.

"She's not what I'd call exciting."

"Well, call Bebe or Craig or someone, I don't know, one of those fancy persons you and your husband hang around with, and get them to take our spots."

"I'm _so_ sick of everyone," she moaned. "I like you best, Stanley, you know. And Kyle's really all right if he's not directing it at _you_, if you know what I mean. He can carry on a conversation, anyway. ... I think what I am saying is, it works as a group, the four of us, don't you agree?"

Really I didn't, but at this point I just wanted her off the phone. "Certainly. Or, why don't you call Clyde? He can bring that girl he's seeing."

"Oh, Clyde is sick, too. I don't know. I want to go to dinner."

"Just go without us," I repeated, keeping myself from gritting my teeth.

"I just hate it when things don't work out!"

"Oh, sweetheart." I sighed, cradling the phone between my shoulder and jaw. This wasn't easy to do with that convoluted princess phone, but I'd somehow taught myself over the years. "I know, dear. I know. You had a baby. Everyone is the same, and yet it's all somehow … different."

She swallowed back something, and sniffled. "Exactly."

"And you feel like your entire world — it's just been snatched away from you, but you have this gorgeous child now, and it doesn't make sense."

"That — that is really how it feels sometimes. How do you know how it feels?"

"My sister has nine children," I reminded her. "The first of them was born in the bedroom next to mine."

"Well, I didn't know _that_."

"Because no one needs to know that. Wendy, I'm desperately sorry. We can't make it tonight. I love you and we'll make plans for some other evening. A week from tonight, perhaps?"

"Perhaps."

"I'll call you on Monday. Let's have tea."

"I want to get out of the house—"

"We'll do lunch out. I don't know. I'll call on Monday."

"Okay."

Relieved to get her off of the phone, I ran back upstairs, finding Kyle in the exact same position I'd left him, but sleeping again. Sitting down on the bed, I bent over and whispered, "I cancelled." He didn't react at all, so I repeated myself, louder. Again, no reply. "Oh, you poor thing," I said, now slightly worried that he was going to get _me_ sick, sleeping in my bed while his germs or microbes — whatever he had — burrowed themselves into my linens.

I went back downstairs and got him a glass of cold water from the kitchen, leaving it by the bedside if he needed it. Stroking the back of his neck before returning to the typewriter, he felt hot and clammy.

It seemed I'd been writing for quite a while, but spying the clock, it was only about 9 p.m. Three hours seemed respectable, so I checked on Kyle again; he was still asleep, but had turned over, and the water glass was somewhat emptier, so I felt confident that he was sweating it out and went to eat something. There was very little in my pantry, but I had half of a leftover sandwich wrapped in cellophane in my refrigerator; cream cheese and Branston wasn't exactly my favorite, but I was hungry, so I ate it. There were some stale digestives and part of a loaf of bread on the counter, so I ate those too. I couldn't find any fruit or vegetables, wondering what was wrong with me that I had nothing in my kitchen approximating a balanced diet. In any case, I didn't much worry about it. Kyle fed me fairly well most of the time.

Another two hours — the cumulative total of my night of writing was 12 pages, which wasn't a lot on the whole, but I felt quite proud of myself for having been productive at all. I had no idea where this book was going, and I hadn't written a book in over a decade — and I'd never written non-fiction to begin with. I felt it wasn't so different from my previous efforts; even memoirs needed story structure, had to follow patterns. It was merely the safety net of invention that kept me comfortable while composing prior novels. They had been somewhat autobiographical anyhow. Now I was keeping the names straight, trying to relive something I felt to be significant, even if I was uncertain in which way it would prove to be significant. Perhaps a good stopping point for this story was my meeting with Kyle, who had shocked me out of my adolescent slump and shown me what England looked like away from the cloisters and stones of Oxford.

Satisfied, I went back up to check on Kyle again. Still sleeping — but this time I felt the need to wake him. The water hadn't been touched, or if it had been, only just; he'd rolled over and was on his stomach again. It couldn't have been easy to breathe that way, so I sat down next to him and stroked his back. "Darling," I said, trying not to shock him but trying to wake him. "You've been sleeping a long time."

He stirred, but didn't turn over.

"Kyle, wake up."

He just shrugged at this.

"Wake up, darling," I repeated. "It's late." His body felt hot, and wet. It couldn't have been more than 20 degrees up in the loft — I had the heat on, but the flat was cavernous and it was difficult to circulate air through all the emptiness.

Kyle stirred, blinked one eye.

"You're really sick," I said. "I'm worried. Don't you think you should see a doctor?"

"No," he rasped. "No doctors."

Unsure what else to do, I took it upon myself to call Ike. Although it was late, Flora answered the phone, sluggish and detached. "Hello?"

"Hello, Flora, dear," I said, trying to maintain my calm so as not to annoy her. "It's Stanley Marsh."

Being not just stupid but willful, she replied with a big, dumb, "Who?"

"Kyle's friend."

"Oh."

"I was calling for Ike—"

"It's 11 p.m.," she informed me, as if I hadn't a clock and couldn't figure this out myself.

"Yes, I'm so sorry. I have a problem. Is your husband at home?"

"Well, as it happens, no. Try the office. And please don't call past 10 from now on." And with that, she hung up the receiver and our call was over.

So I made a second attempt, this time ringing Ike's clinic, doubtful this would prove successful. And yet, it did; he answered the phone with promptness and a stern, "Hello. Broflovski."

"Hello, Ike," I said pleasantly, although I felt anything but. "It's Stanley Ma—"

"I know who it is," he snapped. "What can I do for you?"

Had I not been barely restraining myself from panic, I may have marveled at his recognition. In any case, I explained that Kyle was ill, giving a short synopsis of our evening. "Generally I wouldn't call," I admitted, "but I'm dreadfully worried."

"What's his temperature?" Ike asked.

"I don't know. I haven't got a thermometer."

"How in this day and age does Kyle not have a thermometer? Any excuse to do something rectally, I assume he would be prepared to take advantage of."

"Oh, that's unique and clever," I deadpanned, hoping Ike understood it wasn't. "But we are at my flat and _I_ haven't got a thermometer."

"Take him to a hospital or something," Ike suggested.

"Well, that is why I am calling," I explained. "He doesn't want to go."

Ike sighed. "Call an ambulance."

"He wouldn't like that. But I'm worried, Ike. I wouldn't call if I weren't worried."

For some reason, this enraged him: "What is wrong with you? What Kyle likes or doesn't is irrelevant if he's ill! He forfeits his right to object to suggestion! But all right, fine, if you're really too impotent to handle something straightforward on your own, I'll come over. My god, you don't even own a _thermometer_." He paused. "I have a car. I'll be there shortly. Address?"

XXX

A mere half hour later Ike Broflovski stormed into my flat, greeting me not with 'this is a nice place you have' or even 'hello' but rather, a very curt, "So, where is my brother?"

"Upstairs," I said, and I led Ike up to the loft where Kyle was half-conscious in bed, curled up around a pillow and grimacing. Ike rolled his eyes when he stepped on a discarded pair of pants, and his face fell at the sight of Kyle so ill. Ike sat down on the bed — my bed — and grabbed Kyle's limp forearm in order to take a pulse, or at least that was what it seemed to me was occurring, as I had no medical training and Ike hadn't said more than five bloody words to me.

Ike dropped his brother's wrist and, with an exasperated sigh, turned to look up at me. "Why in the bloody hell haven't you taken him to see a doctor?"

I threw my hands up. "He didn't want to."

His eyebrows shot up and, wrinkling his nose, he asked, "What are you, daft? _Of course _he doesn't want to see a doctor. It's your priority to _make him_ go see one. I mean, my god, he's barely got a pulse and he's white as a sheet."

"But..." Try as I might, I could not stop a fearful tremor from creeping into my voice. "But he's still breathing," I managed. "He's not…" I twisted my hands together as I gave up the notion of finding a way to complete my thoughts aloud.

Ike rubbed his eyes. "You're a magnificent imbecile. The moment he took to bed you should have insisted he go to a clinic. Calling me doesn't do much good either. Do I look like I've got any sort of way to treat him? What did you expect I would do, produce a respirator from my arse?"

"No, but—"

He stood up, and said, very plainly, " 'But' isn't going to do him any favors. We've got to take him to hospital. Come on, get him a jacket; don't stand there with your mouth hanging open."

"Just a moment," I said. "I won't stand here and be insulted in my own home."

He rolled his eyes at me, the impetuous little bastard. He shook his head, and descended the loft. I glanced at Kyle, and I glanced back toward the staircase. I had a feeling Ike wanted me to follow him downstairs, but I couldn't leave Kyle there alone. I sat on the bed next to him, sinking into my own mattress. He was still turned on his side, facing away from me, curled in on himself, and I could see his languid breathing through the sheets, and some wisps of his hair looking the color of dried blood against my steel-colored linens.

"Kyle?" I waited, barely breathing myself to see if he would provide me with an answer. I saw his head move, but he didn't speak. Other than tensing his shoulders, he couldn't manage much else. From nowhere, I got the biggest urge to spoon up against him, shelter his limbs from the thin air. And yet simultaneously I was afraid to touch him, afraid internalizing the meekness in his form would break me, as well. So I sat with my head in my hands, shaking, wondering if by delaying I hadn't inadvertently killed him.

For all I knew it might have been years before Ike returned, but the way he swept back up the staircase implied to me it had only been a moment or two. "Come on," he implored. "I've got my Volkswagen; it'll be faster than catching a taxi or calling an ambulance from here."

I almost choked on my words. "Is it really all that necessary to go?" I got a nod in response. "But, you think they can fix him?" I flinched at my own question. "I don't —what's he got, I mean, is it serious, is it—"

"I can't diagnose him properly standing right here in your dim little excuse for a bedroom." There was a pause. "But I think we both know exactly what he's got, and it's no use trying to argue with me about it, because we'll get to the hospital and you'll see, he'll get better. He's not going to die from a one-off infection and dehydration — not yet, at least. Can you carry him, or should I?"

"Oh." I scratched my head. I felt incredibly defeated. "I can do it."

In the automobile I sat with Kyle in the backseat, all wrapped up in sheets, because in the end I'd just lifted him off the bed and carried him out like that. He had protested in his exhausted way, barely alert. Ike had given me an aggrieved moan, shaken his head, and opened the door for us. In the nighttime glow of barely post-industrial London, mellow lemon-colored light came from everywhere, streetlamps anticipating the sun's rise. In my arms, Kyle managed to open one eye, and then the other. Uncertainly, I smiled at him, and then as innocuously as he'd opened then, he shut both eyes again and rolled his nose into my upper arm.

"He opened his eyes," I said, unsure if I wanted to raise my voice so I'd get a response, or shelter Kyle in his somnambulant fever.

"Well, that's good," was all Ike could provide me with.

XXX

Ike took us to St. Thomas', which seemed rather distant to me. "Wouldn't Mile End be closer?" I asked, sitting in reception with Kyle collapsed in my arms.

Ike cringed. "Would you please not ask me another question? We're here now, all right? Just keep your mouth shut." He was filling out a form, a responsibility he'd taken on after assuring me that I was too stupid to do it properly.

If I hadn't been holding Kyle, I'd have stood up and kicked Ike in the mouth. He hadn't said a single thing to me that couldn't be considered a judgment or an insult. More than infuriated, though, I was worried sick, clinging to each of Kyle's breaths, the slight trembling of his eyelashes, anything that could be construed as living activity.

After completing the form, Ike stood and said, "Do not move at all." He disappeared for a brief time, before returning with some medical personnel of an indescribable nature, probably nurses or technicians. They took Kyle from me and admitted him. I was left sitting there, not knowing where I was or why I was with this condescending bastard who quite clearly thought me so inferior I was unworthy of a feeling as basic as resentment.

I didn't know what to say, but I was hardly going to burst into tears. I most wanted to destroy someone, or something — put my foot through a wall, or break all of Ike's teeth. Suppressing these feelings, I sat there with him in this reception area saying nothing at all. The entire place stunk of antiseptic and the light was clinical and garish. I never went to hospital if I could help it, being generally healthy aside from the occasional venereal disease, none of which I'd suffered of late.

After some time — 10 minutes, according to the insistent clock across from us — Ike decided to address me: "I've brought him here because I know people here," he said, and he did sound rather dejected. "There are superior hospitals, perhaps, or closer ones, but this is NHS and, well, I graduated with the woman who's overseeing oncology at the moment. I don't have time to explain hospital organization to you" — which was well enough because I didn't care at all — "but suffice to say, I wanted to make sure they wouldn't turn him away."

"Was that a possibility?"

"Well, generally speaking, you'd think it's antithetical to the practice of medicine, wouldn't you? But I've read of it happening. Surgery is like any industry. We _do_ speak to each other. Listen." Ike took a deep breath. "I know you … _care_ for him. Or something. I do too. So understand that I know better than you do. All right?"

This had to be the most ridiculous thing he'd said to me all evening, by far, even as it was also the most sympathetic. I was sort of touched by the acknowledgment that maybe, just maybe, I had some kind of place here. On the other hand, being patronized so made me feel impotent. Not knowing what else to do, I said, "All right."

It was going to be a very long night — the beginning of a longer stretch of months and years.

XXX

By 3 a.m., Kyle still hadn't awoken, so we went downstairs and sat rather dismally at a table against the wall in the cafeteria, Ike going at stale pastries like he hadn't eaten in years. I knew I was hungry, too, but the smell of even the cafeteria in this building was like the scent of anti-erotic sex: latex, plastics, isopropyl alcohol and the peculiar soap-and-polymer vibe of an enema. I had a coffee, and then another. By the time Ike had eaten a second piece of Victoria sponge cake, I had gotten myself a styrofoam container of mash and had doused it in grayish gravy, so at the very least it looked like I was eating _something_ rather than a bowl of empty carbohydrate nothing. If it tasted like anything I couldn't tell.

I was itching like mad to see Kyle, to rush into his room and sweep him into my arms and cry on his face, lubricating his ashen cheeks with my tears. I'd spent my whole life imagining scenes in which one is told his lover is dying of some incurable illness, and how I would react. The other side of the Dickensian workhouse motif was the faint bride-to-be wasting, in a sexual way, of consumption, her lips just chapped enough to pout in a permanent lifelike kiss. The desire to reenact every treatise on mortality I'd ever read was tugging at me, but there I was, effectively neutered in a basement eating potatoes with an uppity Welsh orphan who thought I was stupider than anyone he'd ever met. Even though he hadn't said anything specifically antagonistic to me for about an hour, I was still barely containing my urge to throw a cup of very weak coffee in his face. We hadn't spoken since he'd relayed to me the diagnosis an hour previous. "Of course, formal bloodwork won't be complete until tomorrow," was the last thing he'd said.

Both Ike and the attending doctor on staff had promised me that Kyle's life was not in danger at the moment, that he would wake up and walk out of the hospital, probably within a week, likely less. "It's just a mild infection, but he has a severely compromised immune system, so there you go," I was told. Yes, there I went.

I was busy staring into my cup of potatoes, wondering when this hell would recede and the problems would dissipate. From nowhere, Ike said to me, "My mother never made Victoria sponge while I was growing up, you know. She has never made a pudding, or a treacle tart, or absolutely anything with custard. I'm as British as the day is long and English food has never been anything but foreign to me."

"Kyle doesn't strike me as having that disconnect."

"Kyle didn't grow up at home the way I did. He sat through all these very English boarding schools and got the empire battered into him."

"Literally."

"Yes, well, there you go. Mom was always making me all of this very fattening American food. Jewish food. Polish food. I mean, there's a lot of overlap between all kinds of peasant food, but Jewish food is the worst in the world. Everything is made of lard and ground meat."

"Sounds British to me," I said with the final spoonful of mash in my mouth.

"Like it matters." He sighed. "I'm going to send my children to public school, you know. I'll send them to public school. I want them to have that. I promised Flora this, when we learned it was a boy. She converted, so the least I could do was give her children everything. That includes boarding school."

This horrified me, or at least caught me off-guard. "You were the one who told me how awful it was for Kyle there," I said. "How can you justify that?"

"Because it didn't happen to me? Look, my father went. His father went. And so on. I feel a bit left out." With slightly red cheeks, he continued: "It is my fault that they wasted — no, well, _spent_, I suppose — resources on Kyle that they didn't spend on me. But who do you think is going to lend the next generation of Britons the name _Broflovski_? Not Kyle. My children _will not_ toil in obscurity because of his traumas, do you hear me? All that I've got, I've worked for. No upper-middle-class pedigree for me. But he, he got everything, and he hasn't done a thing with it."

"Well, what was he supposed to do?" I cried, again barely managing to restrain the urge to smack Ike. "Marry and have babies? Not get roughed up in the showers? I don't understand. What would have made it better, if your parents hadn't learned any lessons and just sent you off to school as well?"

"Kyle is a victim; I'm not."

"You're a complete wanker, is what you are."

"And you're infernally stupid." With a sigh of resignation, he tossed the end of a piece of cake into the rubbish bin. "Come on. He might be awake now."

He was, but only just. My chest seized when I saw him like that, irrigated and respirated. Sitting in a chair at the side of his bed, I was afraid to touch him, afraid it wasn't allowed. This man was more to me than anything else I'd ever had, and I felt I couldn't reach out for him. So, weakly, he reached out for me. After I'd said, "Hello, darling," he opened his eyes, which were still a bit dark, and gingerly proffered a hand with tubing taped to it.

Ike was in the room with us, and I tore my gaze away from Kyle to take a gander at his brother. Ike stood there, glowering, and I felt very confident in his disgust for me. But then, I also decided I didn't care, that it was more integral to my happiness at the moment to take Kyle's hand. "You'll be all right," I said, probably softer than I should have done. "Just some antibiotics and fluids and you'll be good as new."

With a creak in his voice, he replied, "They told me."

My mouth immediately bent into a frown. "So they did," I said stupidly. "Well, you'll be fine. We'll have you home soon."

Either from exhaustion or a lack of knowledge about how to respond or both, he attempted to say nothing, choosing instead to shut his eyes as I barely held his hand on top of the knit hospital-issue quilt.

After several more hours of sleep, and several of Ike's phone calls to Flora and his office explaining where he was and what was going on, Kyle awoke somewhat more cognizant. Immediately, he demanded we not speak of this to his parents.

"But they have to know," I pressed him. "You can't possibly hide from them an illness like this."

"I can and I will," Kyle replied.

"I agree with Stanley," Ike announced, rubbing his hands. He'd been wearing the same outfit this whole time, as had I, but each time I saw his stupid green shirt I wanted to strangle him. My urge to do physical damage to him refused to dissipate. "It's no use keeping it from them, Kyle. They deserve to know."

"No." Kyle breathed in short, awkward chokes for a moment; he was still struggling to get a really good grip on his inhalation. "I can't have Mommy and Daddy knowing, I can't, they'll be so disappointed."

"Oh, do cut that 'Mommy and Daddy' rubbish," Ike sighed. "You're not a 14-year-old girl. You're a promiscuous 40-year-old gay man suffering from an AIDS-related complex. Our parents can't punish you any worse than you'll punish yourself. It's sexually transmitted, and entirely your fault, and you've probably gotten Stanley killed, too. So just admit it yourself and let's not waste any more time doing this pointless dance. What's done is done."

The aftermath of that monologue was the first time I'd seen Kyle honestly sob in about four years, since the time he'd straddled me at the breakfast table in my flat. He choked out everything from "I'm so sorry" to "I don't want to die" repeatedly as he wept, tears getting trapped in the tubes delivering oxygen to his nose.

"That was very cruel," I said, narrowing my eyes and flaring my nostrils at Ike. "How do you know it's his fault? How do you know anything?" In a panic, I couldn't decide whether to comfort Kyle or strangle his brother. "You're not going to die, darling, I shan't let you," I soothed, trying to get him to stop. "I'll take care of you, I promise."

"The only way you can take care of him is by using some willpower and ceasing to fuck him, maybe, so you don't re-infect him. Or vice versa."

"Shut the fuck up!" I finally hollered. "No one cares what you think! If what's done is done your input is totally irrelevant!"

"Well, who knows _what's_ done, is my point," Ike said, calm as ever. "Look, being in love's got nothing to do with safety. I've been banging my secretary, for years now. It's got nothing to do with love. You think I can't give Flora diseases because we've got wedding bands? That's stupid, too. I'm sure I may well have done. So for the record, you're an idiot.

"And I love you, Kyle, you'll never know how much, but it's not fucking 1969 and this isn't a goddamn opera. There are no arias, just reality, and this disease isn't a plot device, it's a nightmare. So both of you, _please_, forget everything you _read_ at Oxford, because that trash isn't going to help you. AIDS doesn't care for literary conventions. What's done is fucking done. I have to go home to my wife."

Kyle did not raise his head as he cried into my arms to watch his brother leave.

XXX

Terrified and feeling very alone, I called Butters from a pay phone outside of the hospital cafeteria. He was the only person I could trust not to tell a soul, and really the only person I knew would lend me adequate sympathy. For a moment I felt as though I was betraying Kyle, but he had spent more time sleeping over two days than he had speaking to me, and the therapy of confidence assuaged my guilt. The two or three persons standing several feet away from the phone could hear all of my unguarded conversation, and while I moaned to Butters about the wretchedness of the situation, I could see their expressions, steely and judgmental, assessing me and this 'Miss B' I was on the phone with, probably going so far as to assume she wasn't really a she at all.

"I'll be right over, Stanley," was the last thing she said to me. Sure enough, an hour later I was sitting at Kyle's bedside with the telly on low in the background, and Miss B arrived with a dog leash in her hands.

"Sorry," was the first thing out of Butters' mouth. "I was in such a rush to get here I forgot to put down Desdemona's leash."

I gave him a broad smile, and pointed to Kyle's sleeping form. "Whenever he complains, which he is wont to do frequently, they just stick him full of sedatives until he passes out."

"Poor dear!" Butters exclaimed, dragging over a chair. "He looks very peaceful."

"He's not dead, Butters," I said, rolling my eyes. "Just knocked out."

"Oh, but don't you know that even if he's knocked out he can still hear you?"

"That's got to be rubbish. People have been talking endlessly while I've been asleep this past day, and I couldn't hear a word they've said."

"Oh, but it isn't true!" Butters sat up a bit straighter in his seat. "When Brad was in hospital, after he was injured, the doctors told me to speak to him, that he could hear me. So I talked and talked about the silliest little things, telling him about the flowers and what I was going to make for tea when he woke up." Butters lowered his eyes. Behind him, Kyle's hospital room was quite stark; there were no flowers, as no one knew he was ill. "But then, of course, I knew he wasn't going to wake up again, and a short time later his mother asked to take him off of life support."

Suddenly, my mouth felt very dry. "I wasn't aware Bradley was _in_ hospital, when he, er…" I shut my eyes. "I'm sorry, Butters."

"Oh, don't be sorry." He laughed in a forced, thin way. "That was so long ago. Things are different now. And anyway, Kyle will wake up and you will go on to have a long and happy life together."

"I don't know about that."

"Don't be down."

"I'm trying not to be."

Upon waking and seeing Miss B by his bedside, the first thing Kyle said was, "I should have known you wouldn't be able to keep it to yourself, Stanley." He sighed, and struggled to sit up. "Well, I shan't be winning any beauty pageants this week; how delightful that one more human being is privy to it."

"You look positively decent for someone who hasn't had a shower in some time," Butters said. "How do you feel, though?"

Kyle put his hands to his sides, and gingerly felt along the soft, thin layer of fat that padded his belly. "My insides are daggers," he said, frowning. "But it's not so bad right now, as I've slept it off a bit, and I've got a nice drip here." He indicated the line in his wrist by tugging at it. "So I can feel it's hurting, but I don't so much feel the pain. Do you know what I mean? It's not an altogether good feeling, but at least until this wears off I'll be able to speak with you without doubling over. Did Stanley tell you they keep sedating me? I don't think they know quite what to do with me. I think they'd rather put me out that have to interact with an, um." He slid lower into his bed. "I don't think they've had many cases of this," he concluded.

"What _is_ the exact diagnosis?"

"I appear to be suffering from an AIDS-related complex. It's not full-blown and, well — well. Yes. They assure me that it's not full-blown yet and I will not, ah — _die_ immediately, you know, that it may take up to … two or three years. Some people live nice, full lives for a year, sometimes 18 months." Kyle seemed so sad, so uncertain — as if he were feeling out each tenuous word, teaching himself for the next time he had to say it.

Butters took one of Kyle's sweaty hands in his own. "You know if there's a single thing I can do—"

"Thank you." Kyle shook his hand free. "There's little you can do, I'm afraid. Other than keep this to yourself, of course. Under no circumstance do I want Eric to know. Doubly true for his whore — if he knows I'm ill he'll start making eyes at Stanley again and I just can't compete any longer, I know I'm a broken model now but—"

"That's ridiculous," I said, interrupting. "For a number of reasons."

"Don't talk like that," Butters agreed. "No one could ever take your place. Besides, there may be a cure—"

"Ike says not to count on anything like that."

"Well, is Ike an epidemiologist?"

"He knows plenty; he says it's a retrovirus, whatever a retrovirus is, and—"

Listening to them banter, I shut my eyes. I'd had little sleep during Kyle's hospital stay, and that which I had gotten was brief and uncomfortable, curled on top of two chairs I shoved together in his ward. I'd subsisted on nothing but hospital rations, cups of rice and potatoes and the occasional apple. I didn't dare ask Ike to bring me anything. He had swooped in twice, briefly, over the course of the stay; the second time he'd stormed out just as quickly when Kyle had refused to concede on the point of talking to their parents.

"Do you have _any_ idea how much they're going to hate me if they realize that I kept this from them?" he'd asked.

"It's _my_ life!" Kyle had shouted back, hoarse. "I'm an adult!"

"You're not making decisions like an adult."

"I'm sick! Leave me alone."

"Oh, you want to be left alone?" Ike had asked. "Fine." He just got up and left, stomping out like a child. That had been the last time we'd seen him.

Now Butters was preparing to go home, to feed his dog and mind his bookshop. "If there's anything I can do for you, Kyle, any single thing _at all_—"

"I'm just glad you won't shun me," Kyle replied.

Butters embraced Kyle, tightly, and I decided to walk him out of the building. We got as far as the Westminster Bridge before I realized we were walking in the opposite direction. "How are you getting home?" I asked.

"Oh, the bus I suppose." Butters shrugged. "Don't worry about it. Stanley, you look _exhausted_."

"I'm a bit exhausted, yes," I confirmed.

"You should go home and sleep. Get in bed."

Shaking my head, I replied, "I won't leave him." It was inconceivable that I should ever again want to spend a moment away from Kyle's side.

"If he's sedated all the time, what is the difference? You're no good to him exhausted."

I sighed. (I felt I'd sighed more frequently in the past three days than I had the past three years of my life, combined.) "I just can't, Miss B. You don't understand."

He shook his head, glum and sympathetic. "No, I understand quite well." He grasped my forearm, and kissed me on the cheek — I couldn't remember if he had ever done this before. Maybe so, but it seemed significant. "Anything I can do, Stanley, I meant it — _anything_."

"Thank you," I said. It was cold outside, this being early January, and the wind licking down the river just seemed to exacerbate it. Still, I stood there and watched him set off for the bus, holding myself for warmth, wearing the same shirt I'd been wearing three evenings ago. This was the first time I'd been out of the actual building in 72 miserable hours, give or take, but it felt like so much longer.

XXX

In the beginning of Kyle's hospital stay, there had been lines in him: Lines in and lines out, bringing in and carrying out food, all of which was reduced before being introduced to his veins into a pure slurry of nutrients. It was a mockery of a travesty of a diet, especially for poor Kyle, who loved food more than anything. He associated it with his mother, who'd first given it to him, and he gave food back to the men he cared about — me, of course, but any number of others along the road to the present — as if it were the delicate substance of love consumable. Kyle was nothing if not a consumer, and he saw some kind of glamorous status in the acquisition and digestion of well-crafted delicacies. A stay in hospital sucks the joy out of eating, and out of food. What was once a social ritual has become another groggy nurse on the first shift swapping out a baggie of mush.

Now he was back on food, and the lines were out, although if he was too tired to make it to the loo I would hold a metal canteen up for him, and he'd piss into it. "This is so depressing," he noted, with absolutely no joy in his voice. "I'm sitting here fucking pissing into a bloody can. How did this happen to me?"

"It's soon to be over, is the important detail," I assured him.

"Oh, no." He shut his eyes. "Haven't you been listening to the surgeons? This never ends. I will be pissing into cans for the rest of my life, which is unlikely to be very long at all, really."

"But you don't sound sad about it." It was true; his words were now just devoid of any kind of melancholy. He sounded defeated, but not miserable. It was difficult to place this kind of tone, because in all the years I'd known and treasured him, Kyle had tended to speak in jubilation or misery, victory or defeat. Resignation was not familiar to him.

"At least you can eat again." It was true, he could eat, but the treacherous beauty of food was missing from these plastic dishes the hospital served to him on a tray. There was usually a small dish of pasta, dressed in machinated tomato and mild basil, cooked for so long that the spaghetti might as well have been squashed into a pudding, for all it was over-boiled. I fed him, gingerly, so as not to upset his digestive system, which was apparently teetering on the precarious edge of recovery and relapse.

"The slightest disturbance might flare the problem up again," Ike cautioned us one late afternoon, having decided we were worthy of his precious time again. I was feeding Kyle a gummy preparation of bland macaroni cheese. He was perfectly capable of feeding himself, and yet we kept doing this, with no discussion between us. A tray of things would be presented by a nurse and no sooner than she had left, I was giving him sustenance. According to the Guardian I'd bought that morning, we'd been here four days; it felt like years. Time itself was beginning to loosen, to lose meaning. I wasn't trying to fight it. I was trying to take comfort in the simplest acts, like watching Kyle chew.

God, I loved him.

XXX

I brought Kyle home to his flat in a shiny black cab because I thought he would like the relative normalcy of paying the fare and rolling down the window to feel the winter frost. Perhaps he did, but he never said as much. We were silent the entire ride, holding hands and looking to each other meaningfully. I had so much I wanted to say, but the words didn't come. He was well enough to walk out of hospital, but he had dark, baggy eyes and his cheeks were slightly gaunt. His hair had grown in enough to cover his eyebrows, or maybe without his customary manipulation it was just unkempt; his nails hadn't been cut. To travel home he wore a dingy gray sweater I had brought him, along with the pair of pajama bottoms he'd been wearing when he was admitted. Rarely had I seen Kyle so under-groomed.

A bouquet of four dozen white roses sat on the kitchen counter when we arrived, arranged in one of those flawless Lalique vases. He cracked his first smile of the morning when he saw them. "Are those for me?" he asked.

"Yes."

"From you?"

I nodded.

"Oh. That's sweet." He dropped the bag he was holding and petted a single bloom. "It's lovely, dear. Thank you." Kyle sat down at the counter and fussed with a spray of baby's breath. "Would you mind bringing me the cordless telephone? I have to do something about my hair."

"I think it looks fine."

He rolled his eyes. "You're obligated to say that. But I won't return to society until it's been fixed."

I brought him the phone.

"You can stop looking at me like that," he said, dialing from memory.

"Like what?"

"Like you're—" He interrupted himself and waved me off: "Hello! Sweetheart, it's Kyle Broflovski. How are you? … Me? I'm all right, I'm fine. Well, _no_, I'm hardly fine. My hair is atrocious. It's really bad. … Oh, don't ask me how it got that way. How soon can Evelyn squeeze me in?" He was silent while he scribbled something down, probably a date, on a random scrap of paper. "Oh, that _is_ a relief. And what about nails?" He glanced down at his right hand, inspecting his cuticles. "It's just awful, just awful. You'll cry if you see me. Manicure at 10 tomorrow and hair right after? Sweetie, I love it. Thank you. I'm excited. I love it. Yeah, thanks. Cheers."

He hung up the phone, and slid it away on the surface of the counter. "Well, that's settled. Oh, I thought I asked you to stop looking at me like that!"

"Like what?" I asked, taking a seat next to him.

"Like I'm dying!"

"All right." I shrugged. "Darling, I don't know that I'm looking at you like anything."

"Yes, you are! You are looking at me like — like I've got the damned plague, or something."

"Well." I sighed. "Well, haven't you?"

His brow furrowed and he said, "Well, yes, of course." Then he began to cry again.

So I got up, and wrapped him in my arms. "I'm sorry," I whispered. "Kyle, I don't know what to say."

"Don't say anything," he blubbered. "I need to be alone for a while."

"All right. I could do some errands. Shall I come back for dinner?"

"No." Kyle sniffled into my chest. "I don't know when you can come back."

"Tomorrow?" I asked.

"Stanley, I don't know!" He cried harder. "I don't know anything anymore! I cannot do this!" I felt my shirt moistening where he was pressed against it.

"You won't do it alone, though. I'm here."

"But I don't want you here," he bawled. "Please go." Even as he said this he was clinging to me.

"Kyle."

"Please, please just go."

"I don't want to leave you alone."

"If I need you, I'll call you." He sniffed loudly and removed himself from me. He still looked gaunt and ungroomed, but now his face was swollen and wet and red. Unattractive as it must sound, it was relieving to me, as if nothing else he looked positively alive.

"I have a life to live," he said carefully, echoing my thoughts. "I must straighten things out with work. I must pay my bills and pick myself up and get my hair fixed tomorrow. Yes, and then I think I should require some food, although I can't imagine wanting to eat anything." I was staring at him, but he was averting my gaze, and it became clear that he was no longer speaking to me. "Call Ike and tell him I'm all right," he added. "Call Miss B, too. Yes, I should give her a ring."

It was all too clear that any semblance of conversation had ceased. Gradually, his clutch on me slackened, and I stepped away. Then Kyle folded his arms around himself and bowed his head, crying still. For several minutes I stood in the dramatic light of morning, which came in through the eastern-facing windows. He was crying, looking miserable, holding himself as if he were his own harness. I was wishing, begging in silence for him to look up at me, to rush up to me and grab me again and tell me not to leave. As he did not waver, it slowly but profoundly occurred to me that rather than a unit, we were two men standing alone in the same room, even if we were feeling the same things. This notion itself was enough to force me to leave, which I did.

At home, I found that my flat stunk of stale air and the 11 a.m. church bells startled me. Out on Hoxton Square, schoolgirls with ribbons in their hair chased around the lawn with apples in hand, eating late-morning snacks. Dustbins overflowed with rubbish and pigeons pecked at it, stealing Cadbury wrappers for nests or choking on crisps splintered into dozens of tiny pieces. The heater kicked in, gurgling hot water through its pipes, and my phone rang out across the room, shrilling me toward action.

None of it really meant anything.


	7. Chapter 7

Boo.

So, this chapter is 35,000 words.

* * *

The key to Kyle's flat was burning a hole in my pocket. Without him, my life was devoid of meaning. But he did not want to see me, or speak to me. A nervous wreck, I spent excess time sitting in pubs drinking whisky and wondering what I had done wrong. I couldn't think of anything, and yet it had to be _something_. I'd called Ike when he was ill — but if I hadn't done that, Kyle would probably have died. I rationalized that he couldn't possibly be angry at me for saving his life. I'd told Miss B, but I'd had to tell _someone_. Now Kyle's secretary would not put me through to him during the day. "He will call you right back," she droned, unamused.

Recently I'd learned that her name was Caroline, and so I very kindly said to her, "I really beseech you to put me through. Please, _Caroline_. I am _distraught_ without him." I felt Kyle would not want me telling her that he was terminally ill, and it was better to let her think we were experiencing marital trouble — that is, if it even occurred to her that our problems were marital.

"Mr. Marsh," she replied one afternoon. "I can only give him so many messages before he snaps at me. He probably doesn't want to speak to you. I'm sorry."

"You don't understand," I wheedled.

"Not really, no," she admitted. "But it isn't my business."

So I spent the days without Kyle with Wendy and her daughter. We took Willa to Harvey Nichols, to tea at the Orangery, and to Sloane Square, which I found supremely ugly. But there were such fabulous cafes up and down the little streets and the area was flooded with young girls in flouncy skirts, so it felt charming to me, and I made do. The baby was duly impressed with none of this. Tea didn't amuse her, and certainly watching her mother try on blouses was equally disinteresting. Infants can be _so_ difficult.

Wendy complained about her weight. "I need my figure back," she moaned, whilst modeling a Westwood. It was so self-satisfying and indulgent of her. She'd put on barely anything and most of it had come off with the baby.

"What I think we need is sandwiches," I suggested. "Nothing goes with a new dress like sandwiches."

"If I eat another sandwich I shall burst and if I burst I shall scream!" she exclaimed. This was the baby's cue to begin screaming. We then had to rush to a restroom, where Wendy changed her nappy.

"I'm getting a nanny," she announced afterward. "I'm too rich not to have one."

"Suit yourself," I said with a shrug. At no time did it occur to me that perhaps we were both too immature to be slumming around Knightsbridge with a three-month-old baby, even at age 40. (Or in Wendy's case, nearing.)

One afternoon over avocado and cress sandwiches in some café, sans baby, Wendy said to me, "You know, Clyde is really ill."

"Oh, that's awful," I said, bored, hardly listening. "Do you want another glass of Billecart?"

"Yes, that would be lovely," she agreed. "It's wonderful to be able to drink again."

So I ordered us refills. When the waiter had left, Wendy promptly repeatedly, "Stanley, Clyde is very sick. Token is distraught."

"Well, if he dies I'll send Token a condolence card."

"Stanley." Her tone was steely and focused. "Clyde is going to die, don't you understand? He's in hospital. I think he has … you know." She sighed. "Poor Clyde."

I dropped my forkful of vinegar-doused rocket and gaped at her. Finally, I understood. "_You know_ meaning he has AIDS?"

"Shhhh!" She clasped a hand over my mouth, which was very rude. "Not so loud!"

I shoved her hand away. "Wendy, you cannot just say something like that in a public place and expect me to withhold my reaction!"

"What reaction? Why do you care?"

"If you don't know why I should care, why are you telling me?"

She blinked. "I don't know!"

We finished the meal in terse silence, Wendy every so often checking her watch or reapplying lipstick, just to have something to do. By the end of the second round of champagne and the last scraping of our forks against the china, she had put on such a lacquer of bubblegum grease that I was certain she'd eaten more of that than luncheon.

I paid for lunch, or rather Kyle paid for lunch, as I used his charge card and signed his name. No one ever asked me to produce identification when I did this.

XXX

Had it been only a week? I missed Kyle dreadfully. On Friday Butters rang to say, "Kyle says no drinks tomorrow. He sounds very glum but he asked me to phone Eric and make up an excuse. Well, I hate lying. Have you got an excuse?"

"You can tell him I am quarreling with Kyle," I suggested. "It's mostly true."

"Well, you have my sympathy if it's true, although I don't think it is true, is it? Because I don't think—"

"I don't know, Butters." This annoyed me. I was sitting on the couch in the dark using the princess phone, rolling and unrolling the cuffs of my trousers of lack of a better outlet. "He doesn't want to see me."

Butters laughed at this, an awkward little girlish laugh. "Oh, that's not what he wants at all, I'm sure."

"Well, how would you know?" I barked.

For a moment, there was silence. Then Butters replied, "You don't have to yell at me."

This was truly too much for me to handle. "He's really sick!"

Butters sighed. "I know."

"What if he never wants to see me again?"

"He'll get over it. Have you tried flowers?"

"I _started_ with flowers," I said.

"Maybe he's not angry at you at all," Butters suggested. "Look, I don't know how your relationship functions. I'm not really a part of it — but if it were me, I'd much rather be with the man I loved than sulking by myself in a drafty flat. He'd probably like you to reach out to him."

There was a lot wrong with this sentiment. "Well, how do you know what he's like, or if he's anything like you?"

"I've known him about as long as you have," Butters reminded me.

"Look, I don't know what to tell Eric. Tell him Kyle's sick and doesn't want to have people over. You don't have to tell anyone he's sick with _AIDS_."

"Eric is distracted easily enough; I just hate to lie, is all. Stanley, are you lonely?"

I thought about this for a moment. I _shouldn't_ be lonely. I'd been with Wendy almost every day. "I don't know if I'm lonely but I miss him," I admitted.

Butters was obviously rustling around his flat, and I hear the dog barking. "Well, my baby's sick too, actually, so I won't leave her here," his baby being the bulldog. "Why don't you come over and we can chat for a while? I've no reason to go into the shop today."

Not sure why I agreed to go there, but I did, getting on the Northern Line at Old Street and taking it down south to Borough, then taking a bus what seemed to be a long, long way. This was probably the least efficient way to do it, but I was in no rush to be in Butters' company. I hadn't been there for years, probably not since Bradley had died. Butters rarely complained about living seemingly so far from the rest of us. In truth, the neighborhood was not too bad at all — the people who lived here seemed to take pride in their homes, and although it was January, everything looked fresh and bright. It was a sunny day and the streets felt as though people really lived there. While I hesitated to think of Hoxton as a slum, the area still felt risky and industrial. This part of Southwark reflected Butters' general attitude — humble and unexciting, but vital and pleasant.

When I rang the bell, the dog began growling, and didn't stop even when Buters buzzed me in and I ran up two flight of stairs. Miss B had flung the door open, and was hunched over with her hand on the knob, and the other holding Desdemona back by the collar. "Oh, shush," she said, into the dog's ear. "It's just Stanley. You can pet her, if you like. She's irritable because she's under the weather."

"Could I?" I got down on the floor and rubbed the bulldog under her chin. "Don't be foul, doggie. I like you."

"She's just protective." Butters sighed, letting go of the dog and standing up to close the door.

Desdemona dropped to the ground and rolled over so I could rub her belly, which I did.

"Oh, she likes you." Butters double-latched the door, smiling. "You should hear when Douglas comes over. They're not friends, let's say."

"I'll be friends with any dog," I said.

"You could get a dog. Your flat's large enough."

"I had a dog once." I stood up, and the bulldog whined at me for abandoning her. "I don't feel the need for another one. Plus life — it's just gotten stupidly complicated. I can't take care of a dog, Butters. I can barely take care of myself."

"Well, you look fine to me. But then — it _is_ difficult. I understand. Do you want a cup of tea?"

"A cup of whisky suits me better."

"It's _half-one_."

"Fine, then, thanks," I said. "Tea would be nice."

I followed him into the kitchen, sun just beginning to shine through the west-facing window, glaring off the yellow kitchen tiles of the floor and the back-splash beyond the stove. Butters had an old-fashioned flat, but not in the way Kyle's flat was old-fashioned, patrician and orderly; Butters' flat was narrow and claustrophobic, adorable and working-class. The stove pre-dated the Blitz. On the table sat a bouquet of acid-yellow gerberas.

"Miss B," I said. "Who gave you those flowers?"

"Who?" She was filling the kettle under the tap. "Oh, the flowers. Oh, Dougie, of course. Who else would it be?" The tap came off and the stove ignited. "Really, he shouldn't have bothered."

"Why, isn't it nice to be romanced?"

Butters sat down next to me at the table, waiting for the water to boil. "Oh, I like being romanced. The problem is that I don't like Dougie."

This was news to me. "I thought you were something of an item."

"No, hardly. I've gotten myself into such a mess, Stanley. You don't want to hear about it."

Now, generally he'd be correct; I wouldn't want to hear about it. But being that I was suffering the existential crisis of not knowing when my terminally ill lover would want to see me again, even a dumb story about Butters' love life was a welcome distraction. So I said, "Of course I want to hear about it."

"Oh." He settled back in his seat, arms crossed. "Well, if this story bores you at any time, don't hesitate to shut me up. Have you ever had a lover who liked you much more than you liked him?"

"No."

"I'm surprised. I always thought you were so successful with boys, you know."

I rolled my eyes. "Success is relative to what one is interested in."

"Well, I know, but — it's a careful situation. Because I do like him — Douglas. He is sweet and considerate and _really_ romantic. He is intelligent, too — he's a mathematician and they're generally _so dull_, but he'll read anything I tell him to, and we talk about literature. The first thing we did was read _The Hobbit_, which he'd never heard of. Perhaps that was my first clue. We read passages aloud to each other — but his voice was so scratchy and dull. He didn't try to effect any accents, he just read—"

Butters was interrupted by the whining kettle.

"Oh, of course." He got up, pushed his chair in, and turned off the stove.

"I don't like Tolkien either, you'll recall," I said. Already this story was boring me, but I was at least now preoccupied by the dullness of Butters' love life, rather than how much I wished I were with Kyle.

He set a steaming mug of Typhoo in front of me. "Thanks."

"Of course." Butters added sugar and milk to his tea, stirring with a teaspoon. His mugs were all mismatched, which was not how I expected them to be — if one had asked me to theorize about Butters' china service, I would have predicted really fussy, chintzy teacups with pedestal feet and undulating saucers. Not tasteful, but byzantine. Instead, he was holding a mug that announced an exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery, _50 Great Victorian Statesmen_. While he prepared his tea, I tried to count, but was stuck after Gladstone and Disraeli. As, I had to assume, were most people.

"The crux of the matter is that he sends me fancy gifts and tries to get me to marry him. Desdemona doesn't like him. I really don't mind a casual companion. He's fine, I like him _fine_. I should say at this point we're great friends. I do like him. I just don't want — he's not the one. I'm sorry, I must sound so spoilt complaining about this: 'Oh, a man likes me too much.' But I don't want to hurt his feelings! I care about him too deeply.

"The worst is that he often says, 'You'd like me more if you weren't still hung up on Bradley.' It makes me feel so awful."

"Well, that's a terrible thing to say," and it struck me as odd that anyone, let alone sincere, chipper Dougie, could be so callous.

"He doesn't mean it to be cruel," said Miss B. "He's very sensitive and insecure. He wouldn't say it if he didn't perceive it to be true. What makes me feel lousy is that it _is_ true. Maybe I just don't want another marriage like that. Or — or why doesn't he understand I'm not right for him, we're not right for one another—"

"Haven't you told him this?"

"We have very long, very revealing conversations. Which is just another thing — Brad and I never had such conversations. From the very moment, the first meeting, we — well, we just knew. Nothing ever needed to be said between us."

I nodded, hands around my steaming mug of Typhoo, letting the ceramic warm my palms. This situation seemed delicate, so much inside Butters' head — and yet I was gripped by the sudden determination to solve his problem. "Have you been sleeping with him?"

"What?" Butters shook his head, shocked. "Ah, I don't know, not very often."

"How could you not know?"

He was blushing so hard his face was probably warmer than my cup of tea. "I don't know! How you sleep with someone, anyway? I'm not sure."

"You mean, how do _I_ sleep with someone, or…"

"I mean, does it have to be intercourse? Or just — I don't know, little things, we do these _little things_, I don't know, I never talk about my personal life, Stanley, _never_. Most people assume it isn't true. Well, Eric assumes it isn't true, he tells me bloody _everything_, things I would give my life to never have heard in the first place, but I just don't like to share. _Anyway_. Douglas. I don't know what to do. What should I do?"

I realized he was expecting me to answer. "Oh," I said, trying to figure out if there was any way I could solve this scenario for him. "You know, many blokes like it if you're just direct with them. Maybe you should just _tell him_, and certainly stop having sex with him."

"But he likes having sex with me, and…" Butters blushed. "I like having sex."

"Well, you don't even have full-on sex with him, anyway, so why not just go to some park and do it the old-fashioned way?"

"What's the old-fashioned way?"

Did he really not know? I rolled my eyes. "Put your cock through a hole in some bathroom stall, and see what happens."

"What?" Butters was just so affronted by this, he dropped his tea spoon on the floor and the dog began howling from the living room. "Oh, gosh, that's not me _at all_." Like he expected me to know what he _was_, or something.

"Very well," I said. "Keep fucking Dougie. Just make sure you tell him every single time that you don't love him and this is all for your pleasure. You'll feel _awful_ each time, but I suppose in the technical sense of things, you'll be readily absolved."

"No! That's ghastly! I love Douglas, I do. He's just not for me. No one's for me. If I can't be with Brad, I'd rather be alone."

"Well, you _can't_ be with Bradley, Miss B! He's dead."

"I know."

"So what are you going to do?"

"Not fellate random men in park cottages," he said. "That'd be awful risky and stupid."

"Yes," I agreed, suddenly feeling rather guilty. "It would."

"I have half a mind to just—" In the middle of his sentence, the phone began to ring. He seemed startled, even as he bent over to pick up his spoon. "That's so odd. I rarely get phone calls during the day. Dougie's at work, you know, and Eric usually calls the store. Do you mind if I get this?"

Not only did I not mind, I didn't care. "Not at all. Go ahead."

"Thanks." When he answered the call, he said, "Hello?" and his entire demeanor changed. He looked as though he'd been smacked upside the head. "Oh, hello, hello," he repeated, mechanical. "Yes, too long."

It was a repetitive conversation lasting no more than three minutes, throughout which he wrapped the cord forever tighter around his fingers. The last thing he said was, "Yes, I'm sorry, too. I know. I miss you, too. I know." When Butters returned the phone to its receiver on the wall, he stumbled, wiping his eyes.

"Butters," I said. "Are you all right?"

"I — I don't honestly know. Do you know who that was?" He sniffed, falling back into his seat. "Of course you don't. Stanley, that was my mother."

"Oh," I said, never having met Butters' mother, not even at commencement many years ago. If I had, it'd slipped my mind since. "Is she well?"

"Well, I don't know, I — we haven't spoken in 20 years."

For some reason, this didn't shock me. "I'm so sorry."

"Oh, it's all right. I'm glad to hear from her, it's just, my father's dead." He heaved a sigh, and took a sip of cool tea.

It took me a moment to catch on to what he'd said. "Oh, my god, _Miss B_." My hand shot out to pat her arm. "I'm so sorry."

Butters put the mug down. "Thank you." He laughed, shaking his head, tearing up — but not crying. "He — he wouldn't let us speak. My mother and I, we haven't spoken in 20 years and he's dead. He's dead, so she called me."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be sorry! I hope he's rotting in hell."

"Butters! That's so unlike you to say."

"Is it?" He shrugged. "Well, I do. I hated that man, despised him. And now he's dead! It's _brilliant_."

"_Butters_!"

He clapped his hands, bouncing in his seat. "This is great, you have no idea. That man, he — he kept me from speaking to my mother. They say everyone has some anger, deep down, and that most of us just repress it. I've never repressed it. I hate that man. Hated. He kept me apart from my mother for 20 years. I could only get him to pay for university by lying through my teeth every day, every conversation — telling him I was cured, I'd met girls, I was seeing girls at Oxford. I'd write him long letters about my girlfriends — oh, I'd write about their long blonde hair and their pink lips and beautiful voices. But I was just writing about me, about how I saw myself when I looked in the mirror."

I had never heard this before. I knew Butters' father had chased him off to some kind of program of ineffectual reforming treatments when he was in his early teen years, where he met Bradley — but having never had a serious conversation with him, in all the 20 years we'd known each other, he'd never expounded on his Oedipal complexes for me. (And it was only in my utter loneliness that I could convince myself to really care.)

"I'm so sorry, Butters. Is there anything I can do?"

"Not really," he said. "Is there anything I can do for you?"

The moment felt very surreal.

"Your father just died. I mean, seriously, Miss B, anything at all … ?"

"Don't let's dwell on it." He put his wrists against the body of his statesmen teacup, and frowned. "My tea's gone cold. How's yours?"

"It's empty."

"Well, I could make another pot." He put his thumbs between his fingers. Smashing his knuckles together, he said, "Or — _or_ I have a chilly bottle of white wine. I know, it's afternoon, but I just feel so—"

"Let's drink it," I said quickly, not bothering to let him finish his thought.

When Butters returned to the table, he had a tall, green-glass bottle, a red ribbon tied around its neck with a desiccated cream-colored rose knotted up in the middle.

"That looks fancy," I noted.

"Oh, it's from Dougie." He shrugged.

"He's trying _really_ hard."

"He'd better try harder, then." Butters managed to uncork the thing, and was pouring a generous glass; he wasn't looking at me while he spoke. "After what he did to my baby, I don't know if I can forgive him."

"Did what?"

"Didn't I mention?"

I shook my head.

Butters set the wine bottle down, handed me the glass, and began rubbing his temples. "He left some chocolate, a large box of champagne truffles, on the coffee table for me. I don't know why; I told him not to. Anyway, Desdemona got into it. She almost _died_, Stanley. They had to pump her out. My poor baby!"

"Indeed," I said, feeling genuinely bad. Thinking of animals in pain reminded me of my own dog. "I'm sorry, that's terrible."

"Well, he keeps trying to apologize. So, first he sent this wine. Then the flowers. Do you understand why I feel conflicted now? He does this sort of thing all the time, you know. Not — not to this severity. But, thoughtless things. Do you know?"

Not really.

"I don't know why I bother," he continued. "So, I spent all of earlier this week with Desdemona, making a big to-do out of the whole thing. Chocolate is poisonous to dogs, but Des, well — she's a _big_ dog. So she got a little sick; I shouldn't be angry at Douglas for that. It's not his fault. I mean, it's _his fault_, obviously, but…" Butters rubbed his eyes again. "Well, well — look. She was a present. She was a present from Bradley for my 30th birthday. She was a present from Bradley and then, one day not long after…" Butters just trailed off, a grim look on his face. "I'm sorry for being dramatic," he muttered. "But what if she had died?"

"That would be awful. Butters, I'm _so_ sorry."

"Don't be sorry, I just — I just keep thinking. I'm so worried for you, Stanley, you don't have any idea."

"Why?" I asked. "Look, don't worry about me. I'll be fine." It did not even occur to me, even once, that I perhaps wouldn't be fine, so preoccupied was I with obsessing over two or three weeks of my life without Kyle.

"Well, I talk to Kyle on the phone," Butters said. I was vaguely aware of this, but I didn't really know what kind of things Miss B and Kyle had to discuss. Men or books or something — fantastic literature I didn't like, or gossiping about aristocracy I didn't care about. Something along those lines, I figured, now that I had to consider it.

He continued: "I know it's not my place, it's not my relationship. Lord knows, I have my own problems, my own _stupid_ problems. But you — and Kyle, you both — I mean, good _god_, my father just died."

"I know, Miss B, and I'm dreadfully sorry. You have my condolences."

"I know," she said. "Thank you."

We sat there for a moment, Butters and I, in silence save for the heavy breathing of the bulldog in the other room. I sipped my wine tentatively, wondering why he hadn't poured himself a glass.

Finally, he said, "I should call my mother back. I — I should go up to Durham tonight."

"What's in Durham?" I asked.

"Well — well, I'm from Durham, didn't you know?"

"No."

"Ah." In that one brief syllable, an entire galaxy of things I didn't know about Leopold Stotch came to light.

XXX

The next time I heard from Wendy, she sounded truly grim: "Good morning, mon cher, although it's something of an awful morning. Because Clyde is dying, you know."

"I know, I know. You keep telling me," I reminded her, "but I'm still asleep." Actually, I was quite hungover, having drunk sherry by myself with the radio on until 3 in the morning. "I don't care about Clyde, Wendy. If you're so sad he's ill I'm very sorry, but you haven't ever had one nice thing to say about him! And if you liked him so much I think you should have dropped all the to-do about peerages and just married _Clyde_."

"Oh, Stanley. Your black little heart! _I_ don't particularly care for Clyde — although I wouldn't wish _this_ on him. He's — he _really_ is dying, Stanley. Token's been by his bed for the past 18 hours. I think it's the end, I really do."

"Well, that _is_ too bad." I felt a wave of nausea envelope me. "My condolences to Token. I'll call him when — when it's over, I guess."

"I think you should go to him."

"What?"

"Well, not you — Kyle, I mean. I think Clyde would very much like it if Kyle went to him. And, well, you're something of a set, so — I'm sorry, this is Token's bad idea."

Sitting up, I readjusted the receiver so I could speak more directly. "Wendy, Kyle won't talk to me. He's been ignoring me for two weeks."

"I know," she said, although she really didn't have any idea beyond the cursory explanation I had given her two weeks ago that Kyle was temperamental and we weren't getting along. It wasn't exactly _untrue_, although I wasn't so much angry at him as he was suffering an emotional disconnection. Kyle would fight with anyone about almost anything, though, so it really wasn't worth parsing for her. No one had any trouble believing the vaguest of explanations. "Sorry," she mumbled. "I'm so _tired_ at all hours I forget other people have problems."

"It's all right. Look, Wends. Put Token on the phone and I'll talk it out with him."

"Can't do, dearest, _sorry_." She coughed into the phone. "If he weren't entrenched at Clyde's bedside I think he'd be at work right now."

"Right." It was easy to forget other people had lives when mine seemed rather empty. "How's the baby?"

"Beautiful." Her tone picked up. "I think we get along better with a third party, you know. It's just — I don't want to say I had _no idea_ this would be exhausting, but I'm afraid the concept was rather academic. We're fine now, though — my mother's helping now. Token's parents are being rather a nuisance, implying I've done something awful, having this daughter. Those people waited 20 years for a grandchild. They can wait another two for an heir, I should think."

"Don't let anyone force you."

"You know me, Stanley. I don't let anyone force me."

"Quite right."

"But I should force _you_ around more often. Go to Clyde, and take Kyle with you."

"But I don't know that Kyle will go anywhere with me right now," I said.

"Well, Stanley." She swallowed. "Have you asked?"

XXX

There comes a time when a man has to face his fears and confront a problem head-on. To this effect, when Kyle did not pick up the phone, I stood up, tied my shoes, and went immediately to Notting Hill Gate. He could try to ignore me, he could screen my calls — but I didn't think he would resist a direct appeal.

There was no answer at the buzzer, but when I got upstairs to the front door of his flat, I heard the muzzled sweep of a symphony behind the door. I knocked before using the key, and sure enough, the turntable had an LP spinning on it, going too fast for me to read the label — but it was unmistakable Gilbert and Sullivan. It took me a minute, but at the first lyrical chorus — _with aspect stern and gloomy stride _— I realized it was _The Mikado_. Appropriate enough, I thought, but then he called out, "Oh, don't just _stand there_," and I turned around only to realize he was lying on a couch in that kimono dressing gown. "Yes, I'm here," he said, sitting up.

"Kyle—"

"_Shhh_." He put his finger to his lips. "Wait for the act break."

Not knowing what else to do, I sat down on the couch opposite him. I hadn't even taken my coat off. For a few moments I was happy enough to listen to the operetta as it played out. It had been some time since I'd heard to the piece from start to end, and was enjoying the caustic jubilation of the whole thing. But then came the part in which the story devolved into, "But as you've got a month to live, long life to you," and so on. I rolled my eyes at the heavy-handedness of Kyle's choice in music.

He, on the other hand, was quite enjoying it, conducting a small orchestra for himself with his index fingers, eyes shut, humming along. He looked much better than when I'd left him last, having gotten what seemed to be a flattering haircut, and much of his color back. He didn't look ill at all, really, except that he was cloaked in the trappings of sickness, lazing around on his own like a recluse, feeling sorry for himself.

"_There's lots of good fish in the sea_, darling, really?"

"Stanley, shush."

As the needle skidded off the record on a crescendo, he straightened the tie on his robe and said, "Will you get that for me?"

So I got off the couch and pulled the needle from the LP, and threw my coat over a chair before I sat back down. "You're very immature," I said when I did, crossing my legs so as to appear more adult. "Running from me won't solve anything."

"I wasn't _running_," he said. "I wanted a bit of time to myself. I can't say I'm not a bit upset it took you this long to chase me."

"I'm not a dog, Kyle. I am not in the habit of hunting."

"Yes, well." He sniffed. "That's been established well by now. Of course. How stupid of me." He buried his face in his hands. "There were times, you know, when I sat at my desk for hours, just wondering if you'd decided to be done with me. I realize I'm — oh." He wiped at his eyes. "I've been vacillating between content resignation and grim desperation. I can't talk to anyone, except Miss B—"

"You could have called me," I said.

"I wanted you to call me."

"I called you about a hundred times. More, maybe."

"I wanted you to come for me," he said, voice cracking.

"Well. I'm here. Right?"

"Right." He extended his arms toward me.

Moving to the other sofa, he embraced me, rocking both of us back and forth. "I missed you so much," he whispered in my ear — not because it was a secret, but because with any more volume he would have crumbled into abject sobs.

"I know." I pulled away and cupped his chin. "You were all I could think about."

"What did you do without me?"

"Oh, wasted my days with Wendy and the baby. Went over to Butters'."

"He said as much. I'm surprised — you never go over there."

"I was desperate, darling. I don't know what to do with myself without you. I've meant every word, Kyle. I'll take care of you."

"You don't have to take care of me. I'm not dying … yet."

"But—" My hand flew to my mouth. "Oh, god, I didn't mean—"

"It's all right," he said, crawling away from my embrace, disconnecting. He rolled his eyes. "I've been thinking the same thing, obviously. Without end, for days and days. I've been reading, I've been working — but it's all I can do to pretend I'm looking at the monitor when, really, I'm thinking to myself, 'This is the end. I'm going to die, ugly and breathless and starving.' "

"You're not ugly."

"I will be."

"Kyle…"

"_Stanley_."

"Kyle. Two years—"

(As an aside: "Maybe less.")

"—is a long time. You don't know, no one can know, what sorts of medicines brilliant men can invent, what one can learn about the pathology of a virus—"

("_Retrovirus_.")

"—in that time. I'm not saying this to give you false hope. I'm saying it—"

Kyle's eyes shut. He breathed, "Because you believe it." And he opened them again, shaking his head.

"Kyle, I have—"

Recognition dawned on Kyle and he interrupted me. "You have AIDS? Oh god, I've infected you, I've—"

"Shhhhh, no." I grabbed his hands and held them in mine. "You didn't allow me to finish."

"Ike had told me you should be tested," he continued, disinterested in heeding me. "He recommends, as does any doctor I've consulted, that every man I've been with be tested. Or at least that I ring everyone since 1976. They don't know the incubation period but 10 years seems prudent. I felt so guilty, thinking like some — Christ, this phrase — like some whorish _Typhoid Mary_ I've made half of the world sick. I tried to tell them I couldn't possibly know the whereabouts of many of these fellows, scores of people…"

"Scores of people?" I wished my reaction to this hadn't been jealousy, but the thought of other men fucking Kyle forced me to fight back possessiveness. Worse was the notion that some of these nameless men had held him, been tender with him — or that Kyle had wanted them to be, would have said endearing things and clung to them in bed the way he grasped me.

"Yes, I suppose. I don't know! Mostly flings, dates — at least I know most of their names. I know it doesn't stack up against your faceless thousands, but not all of us are you, Stanley. We should get you tested, though."

"It's pointless. If I'm infected I'll become ill, but currently I'm not ill, and in the meantime there's nothing they could do about it."

"I know." Kyle yanked his hands from mine and wrapped them around himself, sheltering his torso. "It _is_ pointless. Today is the first day in quite some time I haven't come home from work and just sat on the sofa and cried and cried…"

"Well, today is a Saturday." He didn't smile. "If you were miserable, why didn't you call me?"

"I needed to think. I've been thinking, Stanley. About a lot of things."

"That sounds ominous."

Now he laughed, short and bitter. "Well, of course. I've had to find a lawyer who can do wills. It's very tricky. My father has always advised me, but I can't tell him this. We must ascertain your rights, we must be absolutely certain that everything is sound. I find that being methodical is helping me cope."

"I don't want a penny," I said. "Give it to Ike."

"There's no point — he'll get everything from my parents. Isn't that ironic? Like he always wanted. You don't really understand, dear. But I don't expect you to."

"Is it all right to kiss you?" I asked.

He blushed. "Stanley," he said, lowering his eyes. It was alluring and coquettish. "You never, ever need to ask that."

I grabbed his upper arms, the silk of the kimono eluding the creases of my fingers. I brought my lips against his, waiting for his mouth to open. When it didn't, I rammed my tongue through, feeling his moan around my lips and his body slack, his hands at my hips. His head fell back, arms linking. Our mouths stilled against each other, and I felt his trembling, so I drew back.

He rested his head on my shoulder, mouth and nose to my neck. I petted his hair, tucking waves of it behind his ear. "Darling," I whispered. "I have bad news."

"I want to stay like this forever," he replied, not really in any way an answer. "I don't want to die but if I have to, let me have this."

"Anything, Kyle. Anything."

We sat like that for some time, the sun setting lower and lower below the tree line of Hyde Park. The flat became dimmer and soon I could no longer see where Kyle began and I ended.

When it was too dark in fact to make out anything outside but the flashing lights of St. James, I said, "I need to tell you something. Bad news."

"It's been an awful week for news. You might as well. Will it crush me?"

"I should hope not, although I doubt you'll cheer. Old Clyde is dying. He's got AIDS and is dying."

"Oh." Kyle sat up and withdrew, wiping his wet eyes with the back of his wrist. "Yes, that makes sense. Poor old Clyde." He sighed, heaving his shoulders, shaking his head. "I made him sick, did I?"

"How do you know he didn't make you sick?"

"We made each other sick, I'm sure. There must be plenty of strains."

"Well, he is in hospital. On his deathbed, I'm told. By Wendy. Token thinks — well, it would be nice if we went to him. Or you, rather, but I — I'll go with you."

Kyle sighed, doubling over, rubbing his eyes. He sat back up, and said, "I'll go. Of course I'll go. But I don't know why anyone would want me there. Who's going to be there?"

As if this were a social gathering — but I understood what he meant, what he was intimidated by. "Well, apparently Token. I don't know about other people—"

"His parents?"

"Well, maybe. I can't imagine they wouldn't be. It's their only son."

"Then I have to get dressed." He stood up, stretching, reaching out for me. I took his hands. "I'll just be 20 minutes."

He took closer to an hour. But this was usual behavior for Kyle and I couldn't bring myself to mind it.

XXX

And so old Clyde Donovan died, surrounded by his weeping mother, his father, and a handful of resentful homosexuals he'd once studied with at Oxford, made love to, bored half to death. I don't know what his parents made of the fact that we held a vigil with them, that not a single female relationship could be represented in the group — Kyle and I; Token (shaken and distraught, like I'd never seen him); Craig, sans Tweek, which conveyed the weight of the situation. He glared at us when we came in, arms crossed, leaning against the window.

I hated the way no one explained to Mr. and Mrs. Donovan what we were doing there, but they were each so absorbed in committing every one of their son's final breaths to memory that it probably never occurred to them to ask.

At the end, when the even-paced chirping of monitors slowed to a flat, obnoxious cry, I took Kyle out of the room before anyone could speak to us. Perhaps this was rude, but again, I was doubtful that Clyde's parents would notice. To no great surprise, Wendy was sitting on a bench across from the room, baby in her arms, looking rather bored. It was jarring to see her here all the same.

"Token still in there?" she asked.

"Yeah," Kyle answered, in that same annoyed tone he took whenever Token was the subject of conversation.

"How is he?" Wendy asked. "Clyde, I mean."

"He's dead," I told her.

"Oh." She swallowed. "I'm so sorry to hear that."

Kyle snorted behind me, so sure that she was lying.

"Was it a hard death?" she asked.

"No clue," I answered. "He wasn't conscious."

"I'm sure it was just awful," Kyle remarked. This was the first time I had looked at him since leaving the dark of the hospital room, and I was thrown seeing that he was, actually, pale as a sheet. "He was covered in — in sores, I guess, or lesions, and just resembled nothing more than a victim of a concentration camp. He was a corpse, he was…" Kyle shut his eyes. "…_so old_."

"That's really a shame."

"It's depressing," I agreed.

"Terrifying." Kyle shook his head. "_Absolutely terrifying_." He let go of my hand, and began to walk away from us down the hall.

I looked at Wendy. "I never liked old Clyde," I reminded her.

"I recall."

"But I wouldn't wish _this_ on him."

Willa gurgled, and Wendy offered the baby a finger to nurse, which she accepted, seeming content. "Kyle seems bothered by this." She looked back up at me. "I wonder why that is?"

How to carefully stage an answer so as not to give anything away? "Yes, well, he just watched someone die. I think the last time he saw a person expire, he was too young to understand it."

"Oh, but you've watched plenty of people die so you're well into it."

"I literally sat next to my grandfather and watched him die when I was a teenager."

"Ah, but did he look like a corpse?"

"Something like a corpse. He fought in the Somme."

"You don't think Kyle still has _feelings_ for Clyde, does he, and that's why he's upset?"

"I'm sure it's struck him as very upsetting that someone he's had intimate relations with had passed away, yes." I turned to glance at him from down the hall, and spied him leaning against the wall, forehead pressed against a bulletin board, probably squishing his nose up against the cork but it was just too far away to tell. "Look, I'd better go follow him. He is bothered and I'm sure he needs me."

Wendy sighed. I wondered if her finger would wrinkle inside the baby's mouth. "Any idea when Token will be done?"

"Just go in there and ask him," I suggested. "Or better yet, what's keeping you here? You're not his nanny."

She didn't answer my question. "Clyde was never my friend, and I feel going in would be encroaching on a moment I don't belong in."

"Well, that's what I just did."

"No, you went with your husband because a dying man would have wanted him to be there."

"Does it matter? I'll speak to you tomorrow." I hunched down to kiss her cheek, and kissed the top of the baby's head, the dark hair feeling delicate under my lips.

"So long, mon cher." She waved. "Call me tomorrow." I knew I would.

At the end of the hall, Kyle was crying.

"Oh, don't cry," I said, reaching around his torso. He was still leaning on the wall. "It's only Clyde, don't cry."

"I'm not crying for him," he warbled. "Well, I am, and I am not. I'm crying for all of us, really. And I'm crying for me."

I tightened my hold on him, resting my head on his shoulder. "We're not going to let that happen to you," I said.

"What's wrong with you? It's not something you can stop, Stanley. It's not up to you."

"No one ever loved Clyde like I love you." I kissed his neck. "I promise, darling."

"Promise me what? Why are you doing this?" He slipped out of my arms, turned around, back against the wall, cheeks flush and snot on his upper lip. "Don't be foolish, Stanley. Just be glad there was no one except Wendy in this hospital corridor to see us embracing in public."

"Loads of people embrace in hospitals."

"I just don't want that to happen to me."

"Kyle," I said sternly, grabbing him by the wrists and pulling him off of the wall. "I am not going to let you die."

"_Really_?" he spat, eyes narrowing. "It's not up to you! Don't you understand? I am not a 5-year-old! And you are not God! There is little if anything you can _do_, goddamn you!" He stomped his foot and curled his hand into a fist. Then, he released it. "Oh, forget it!" He ran away from me sobbing, like a character in a Regency novella.

I followed him through corridors and around corners. He stopped and rang for a lift, arms crossed, tapping his foot against the linoleum. When it failed to arrive after a minute, he threw his hands up and said, "Of course the bloody lift doesn't come!" and kept going, finding a stairwell and heading down to the lobby. It was about 9, and Kyle stopped at reception. "Excuse me, excuse me," he repeated, slamming his hands into the desk. "Why isn't anyone listening to me?"

"Kyle," I grabbed his hands and tried to still them. "You're making a scene."

He turned around and laughed at me. "This is not a scene," he said. "If I wanted to make a scene you'd better believe I'd do it where I had a bigger audience."

"Regardless," I said. "Calm down."

"I am calm!" He had only stopped crying a few minutes before, and his eyes were still red and swollen. Now he bit his lip, obviously trying to stop himself from bursting into tears. "You don't understand," he said, leaning back against the reception desk, elbows supporting him as he leaned on the counter. "I thought I was doing so well."

I asked the receptionist to call us a minicab, which she did, eyes narrowed at us. On the ride back to my flat, we sat entwined against the window, the car trembling over the ragged asphalt of Theobald's Road.

"What's wrong with me?" he kept asking. "I mean honestly, I'm an adult. Why can't I process this like an adult?"

"How are you supposed to process it? Why does adulthood necessitate that you handle it any differently?"

"I should accept this, be stoic about it."

"That's idiocy."

Kyle mused aloud: "What would some proper British gentleman do, I wonder? What would, say, Craig do? What did Clyde do, do you think, Stanley, when he found out? Do you think he … do you think he broke down in hospital and in cars, or do you think he got up and said, 'Well, this is it, I can't beat this thing,' and put on his pants and went on with his day?"

"I don't know what he did," I gritted, "and I hardly think you should follow some delusional assumption about what _Clyde_ would do anyway." I took his point, I really did, but this was Kyle, after all, and Kyle was not the sort of person who should bottle it up like that. It just wasn't _him_. But then I wondered, _did_ this fundamentally alter who Kyle was, how he should act? The thought was unsettling and, for the first time even during this depressing and draining day, I felt significant unease.

"That may be true, that may be true." Kyle leaned into me, and I felt all of the tension in his body unwind as he rested against me, head dropping to my shoulder. There were sparse, washed-out streams of light along Clerkenwell Road, and where streetlamps shone on his face I could see he was tired, maybe physically but certainly emotionally. "I just want to go to sleep," he said, shutting his eyes. It reminded me of his illness weeks prior, how relieved I'd felt when he'd opened his eyes. I hated how significant every movement of his felt now. Perhaps as a 19-year-old I'd felt the same, as if Kyle were a fleeting moment of my life I should have drunk in as deeply as possible, as if each brief synapse were something worth committing to memory, as if the disparate collection of bodily functions voluntary and involuntary that comprised his existence should be dismantled and weighted individually.

We got to my flat and I paid the driver. Upstairs, Kyle undressed and so did I, glancing at each other, unsure of what was going to happen. Generally at this point in the evening, we had sex. As if by instinct, I developed an erection on sight of his bare thighs, slipping under the covers. He was looking at me expectantly, but I wasn't certain. Should I take off my pants, or find a pair of pajamas and slip them on, get into bed, and shut out the light?

"Well?" he asked.

"Well what?"

"Are you coming to bed?"

Without putting on any pajamas, I said, "Yes," and crawled into the sheets. I kissed him on the mouth, sighed deeply, and reached across his chest to turn off the beside lamp. Settling against a pile of wan pillows, I heard Kyle breathe, long and deep, as if he weren't thinking about it. He probably wasn't. The room (really it was a loft, part of a much larger room, but I felt it was my private little room anyhow) was dark, but it was never pitch-black, as big (but dirty) windows let in the lights of the East End, moonlight and a few street lamps and, seldom, illuminations from across the square I lived on.

I was flat on my back, staring at the ceiling with my eyes wide open, unable to conceive of sleep.

Before five minutes had passed, Kyle rolled onto his side, planting his lips on my neck and his hand on my cock.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

"Isn't it obvious?"

"Well, yes, but—"

He interrupted me. "What kind of man am I if I can't do this for you?"

"Oh god," I said, rolling over to face him. "It's too much to bear, darling, really."

There was a look of such hurt on his face, such sadness and betrayal. Could I even remember a time in my life when I did not see Kyle as a sexual phenomenon? The way he breathed was erotic to me; the way he smelled (a sweet-metallic smell I couldn't identify, that had lingered near his hairline and wrists as long as I'd known him) reminded me of ravaging afternoons in Notting Hill Gate, on the King's Road, in tiny rooms at Magdalen College, with my cheek pressed to his back as I fucked him, him coming in my grasp — and here I was, rejecting him. I couldn't believe I would decline, even with an erection at all, but I looked at the fright in Kyle's eyes, on his parted lips, and I just didn't know how I could allow him to do this.

So I petted his hair, sitting up, and cupped his chin. I hoped the swirl of emotions, the mess that was my own fear mingling with arousal and hesitation, was obvious to him. "Darling," I said, tucking strands of his hair behind his ear. "You're not—" I knew I didn't want to say that. "It's been such a long day, a long week. I'm tired, you're tired. You're not thinking straight, and your brother _did_ say to abstain from sex. So we can't — I just don't know, I'm sorry, I don't know why but it hardly feels right."

He was looking up at me so hopefully until this moment, when he scowled. "So you're going to take this away from me, too? This _too_? I'll lose my life in two years, or less, and I can't have … I can't have…" He couldn't even say the words. "I don't care what Ike said, honestly. Stanley, I haven't…" He trailed off, finishing in a whisper: "I don't even know what words to use to describe why I wish you would let me."

"Well. It seems I haven't got the words to explain why I _can't_ let you."

His eyes became wet, this much I could tell, but instead of crying, Kyle rolled over and went to sleep, or tried to sleep. I stayed awake for some time listening to his breathing, feeling it unsettle the mattress in a subtle rhythm. By the time I too fell asleep, my erection had subsided and the sun was soon to rise. Birds outside were squalling for the coming day, but I was too exhausted then to heed them.

Later, I was awoken by church bells. Kyle was gone, or rather, he was not in bed with me. For a moment, my heart jumped, worrying over where he'd gone off to; it was only the day before I'd gotten him back again, and I couldn't bear the agony of wondering why'd he left, why he wouldn't answer my phone calls. The bedding next to me was soaked, so I knew he couldn't have gone far; then I heard a kitchen cabinet slam, and I realized he was just downstairs.

He was in a rotten mood, though. "You've nothing to eat in the house!" he said, assaulting me before I was even fully awake. "I ask you, what kind of grown man has cupboards this bare?"

"Isn't there something in the refrigerator?"

"Yes, a moldy piece of red Leicester and some expired soured cream."

"_I_ have soured cream?"

"_Had_, Stanley. I threw it away."

I was about to say to him, "You know, darling, not everything needs to be thrown away the day it expires," but he sat down to pout at the kitchen table, nursing a mug of tea.

"I'm famished," he moaned, curling his legs up under him on the chair. "I don't know why you took me back here last night. There's nothing to eat! And I'm starving!"

"I'm glad to see you're hungry," I said. "Let me throw on some trousers and we'll go out for brunch."

But when we got to the Duke of Buckingham, ordered fry-ups and found a seat, Kyle was no longer famished; he could barely eat anything. "I wish I could have a Yorkshire pudding," he complained, picking at the sautéed mushrooms on his plate. "I so badly wanted lunch foods, I think."

I had to swallow a mouthful of fried toast with beans. Then I said, "Well, they don't do roasts until half-one, I'm afraid."

"This whole meal is nauseating me."

I found this cause for concern. "Well, you have to eat something. What do you want, darling? A roast? I'm sure we can find one at another pub. Sandwich? Scones? Chocolate bar? Spag bol? I'm trying to help, Kyle, you _have _to eat. Do you want to go to Maison Bertaux and have a mille-feuille? Anything, darling, _you have to eat_." I couldn't shake visions of old Clyde, emaciated and exhausted; it seemed each time I conjured this he looked increasingly haggard. I wasn't going to let that happen to Kyle. Suddenly I was determined to force-feed him if I had to, spearing ragged cooked tomato and a hunk of Cumberland sausage on my fork. "Come on, have a bite."

"If I eat that, I'll vomit."

"Well, what are you in the mood for?"

"I said Yorkshire pudding," he repeated. "Maybe a plain bap or something. Something bready."

"That's hardly enough to get you through the day," I said. "Do you want some of my toast?"

He stuck his tongue out at the idea. "I've my own fried bread, thank you, to eat if I want it. I don't want it."

"Do you want to go to The Stockpot?"

"No, the idea of eating around a bunch of queens makes me queasy. I don't want to be spied on by drag queens while I eat."

"Then we went to the wrong place," I said, glancing around at the clientele.

"I can't help thinking that they all _know_." Kyle was twisting his paper napkin in his hands.

"Nobody knows, darling. No one's looking at you. You're just being nervous." I said this to assuage my own fears, but inside I was panicking, trying to figure out how I'd get him to eat. When I was sick as a child my mother would just force me to eat anything, cloudy soups and things from cans, tins of sardines and anything oily. "Are you in the mood for some sardines?" I asked.

He looked at me like I was speaking another language. "Sardines?" He gaped, eyes wide with disbelief. "Really?"

"On toast, maybe?" Now I no longer had an appetite for my meal. "Christ, Kyle, you have to eat something!"

"Why?"

"So you don't starve to death!"

"Oh." He cocked his head, narrowing his eyes to look at something; my back was to the bar and to the entrance, so I couldn't say what. "Never mind." He pushed his plate of food away. "It seems I've completely lost any appetite I did have."

Kyle had noticed Kenny, who was apparently also having a noontime pub brunch, as evidenced by his pint of soapy-smelling lager and big, stupid grin. Kenny came over to chat with us, and I had the deep, unsettled feeling that Eric would probably be with him, although he didn't say as much immediately.

"Weird that I spotted you," Kenny said, holding the pint in one hand, tapping his fingernails against it. He needed a haircut, but Eric had him in some hideous tight yellow polo shirt, very much the sort of thing Eric himself would wear. Maybe it was Eric's, from his rower days. That was the sort of thing he would do. The frayed old barely cornflower jeans, though, that was all Kenny. "Was everyone up late last night celebrating? Eric's in a revelatory mood."

Kyle was digging into me with a look, _don't you dare mention a single thing about me or AIDS to that brat_. (Clearly I wasn't going to.) "Yes, well." Kyle was trying his best to seem disinterested. "Life's so busy, sometimes you just, um…" He trailed off, shrugging. "Well, we were doing something last night, anyway."

"Oh, got it." Kenny winked at us.

Not wishing to contradict this assumption, I nodded. "Right. Yeah."

Then Eric found us. "Have you boys heard the news yet? It's a dark morning for someone, I'm sure." His glee was thinly cloaked. "Donovan is dead."

"Who, you mean the singer?" Kenny asked.

"No, Clyde Donovan," said Eric, shoving Kenny out of the way to make room for his bulk against our table.

"We know," Kyle muttered, looking away.

"Oh, yes." Kenny nodded. "_Clyde_. From Her Majesty's Home Office."

"Yes," I said. "Well, no longer. I suspect the funeral will be sometime this week, although Wendy should tell me exactly."

"Ah, of course." Kenny rolled his eyes. "The right-honorable the Viscountess Black."

"Yes," I repeated. "My friend, Wendy."

"We were with him last night," Kyle said, crushing his paper napkin into a ball in his hands. "When he died, you know, Eric. How'd you find out, anyway?"

"There is an obit," Eric replied. "In the Sunday Telegraph."

"Really!" Kenny whistled his appreciation, smirking. "Old Clyde Donovan of Her Majesty's Home Office? Who knew he was so popular? I mean, who goes around constantly thinking about the Home Office?"

"You'd do well to learn everything you can about the Home Office," Kyle said, kindly. "Assuming you'd regret being deported back to Ireland."

I wasn't interested in hearing a conversation between Kyle and Kenny about the Home Office, or the legality of Kenny's residency. So I asked, "What did the obituary say?"

"That he was a loyal servant," Eric reported. "English with Herbert Garrison at Oxford, close friend of His Grace, the Duke of Pederasty. Enjoyed racquetball and was a member of something — oh, White's. I've been thinking of joining, actually. Perhaps I'll submit an application, now that I know they're down a member—"

"Nobody wants a fucking Nazi immigrant in their precious hoity-toity Tory club," Kyle spat. "Good luck."

"No, but I'm sure they'd appreciate the wit and repartee of an educated Tory businessman such as myself," said Eric.

"An educated German Tory homosexual, you mean. Do you think you'll ask for an associate membership for your live-in lover, or will he have to make his own?"

"The last thing I'd like is to belong the some fucking club," said Kenny.

"Shut up, Kenny. Listen here, Jew. _Jewess_. You're an abominable drain on this society. One day I'll sit in the loo crying tears of joy as I read your obituary: Cunty fat-arse Liberal Jewess, died of an infection caused due to unusually high concentration of _sand_ in his _vagina_—"

"Fuck you, Eric!"

"—son of inestimable American bitch MP, middling post at moderately successful advertising firm, _never married_. That was the last line of Clyde's obit, too, which you'll see if you pick it up. _He never married_. Nothing about fucking blokes, of course. Or Page Three girls, for that matter. That's all Clyde ever was, and that's all you'll ever be, Kyle. _He never married_."

"Get out of my sight!" Kyle yelled. This attracted the attention of some drinkers nearby, and a pair of blokes flirting over bloody marys at an adjacent booth.

"Don't think I shall," Eric said. "It's a free pub. A _free house_ by definition. You can't make me."

Kenny rolled his eyes, tugging at Eric's sleeve. "Maybe we'd better clear out."

"I'm still drinking."

"There are other pubs," Kenny said.

"But this one comes with the advantage of spoiling Kyle's lunch," Eric replied. "Not that he seems to be eating it, being anorexic or whatever. Or are you just hungover? You have that sallow look about you, Kyle, as if you've been up half the night vomiting Stanley's semen by the bucketload. That's understandable, I couldn't digest it, either."

"Oh my god," I said, really exasperated. "Will you two _please _leave us alone?"

Eric's hand curled tighter around his pint. He bent over me, smirking, and said, "No."

"Then we're leaving." I stood, grabbing my coat, slipping it on and tying the buckle without buttoning the front closed.

Kyle just sat there, chin resting on his fist, eyes down on the floor.

"I think you should just run away from your problems," Eric said, grabbing at a piece of congealed fried bread on my plate. He was about to take a bite of it when I grabbed his wrist and yanked it from his mouth.

"Don't you _dare_ fucking eat my food," I said, not that it mattered or that I was planning on finishing it.

Eric snapped his hand back, shocked, setting the pint of Guinness down on the table, where it sloshed over onto Kyle's plate. "You were done with it," he spat, "so what's it to you?"

"If you're going to eat another man's scraps, you should wait for him to leave the table."

Kenny stepped forward, putting a hand on Eric's shoulder. "Let it go," he said, meeting my gaze with a kind of mutual détente, like a plea. "It's not worth it. They're leaving."

"You've ruined my morning," Eric said, pushing me aside to take my seat at the table. "How's that, Jew?" He peered across at Kyle, trying to get his attention. "What, are you sad about Clyde? It's better now. He was miserable."

Slowly, Kyle raised his head. He blinked at Eric, scowling. Finally, he said, "I know he was miserable, Eric, I was there when he died." Kyle got up, pushing his plate of food into Eric's drink, fumbling for his coat hanging off a brass hook. When he was all buttoned up, he turned to Kenny and said, "It's all yours," gesturing at the seat he'd vacated.

I turned back to stare at Kenny, at the mess of his hair and the scowl on his face. "See you at the funeral," I said, trying to be polite, not knowing what else to say.

Eric called back, "I won't be caught dead there!"

We migrated to a coffee shop on Soho Square, where Kyle had a latte and a croissant. "It's not as good as the ones we got in Covent Garden," he said. "You know, that one time."

"Let's walk over there," I suggested, eyeing the dregs of my black coffee. "Pick something up."

"No, I don't think so." Kyle meant to put his head on my shoulder, but then he remembered himself, and leaned back in the booth. "It's quite far, isn't it? I prefer to sit here, stewing in my misery. I wish you'd never fucked that obese sociopath, Stanley. I wish you'd never fucked him and brought him into my life."

"He wasn't obese when I fucked him."

"He's not obese now, for that matter, but I just hate him so much! You've no idea."

I thought I had a pretty clear idea, but didn't say anything about it. "Covent Garden is just around the corner," I said. "Let's walk over for some croissants."

"No, I'm tired." He finished his coffee, and pushed the mug away. "Take me home, all right?"

Kyle would not abide by the Tube again, so we sat in the back of a black cab, caught in the gears of Oxford Circus, pedestrians darting between us and queues of double-deckers. "This is so aggravating," he moaned, impatient to glide past Marble Arch, down Bayswater Road, past the palace, up to his flat. "I cannot go anywhere without running into _someone_. Last week it was Craig, this week Eric."

"You ran into Craig last week?" I asked.

"Yes, at Fortnum and Mason. Buying shortbread. I mean, I was buying shortbread. He was having lunch. With his wife."

"What do you think they were discussing?" I asked, as if I cared what Craig talked about with his wife over lunch. "Reconciliation?"

Kyle snorted at that. "_Please_. Probably their children. I didn't stand there eavesdropping. He shot me a nasty look and I moved on. You know, for the largest city in the world, London is entirely too small."

"London is _not_ the largest city in the world," I said. "Bombay should be larger. Or Delhi. Hong Kong. Something like that."

"Well, _really_, that's hardly my point. My point is that this city is enormous, and here I can't go anywhere without running into someone unpleasant. I should board myself up inside my bedroom, never leave. Except I'd have to go to work, and I'd run into people going to and fro, I'm sure."

"Maybe you don't have to go to work, though," I suggested. I was having a moment of grim clarity.

"That's ridiculous." Finally we'd made it to Marble Arch, and Kyle was too obstinate to notice. "I won't stop working, Stanley, that's simply absurd. As long as I can will my body to move, I'll work. It's just who I am, you know, it's just what I do."

"Fine," I said.

"Okay."

We sat in the back of this cab, staring at each other, tumbling over badly paved roads, past strollers waiting for their companions at the Queensway crossing. Tall buses sped by us. Kyle's hands were trembling on his thighs. The enormity of the situation was suffocating, so I opened the window.

"Close that," he said, inching to the side of the cab, as far from me as possible. "It's chilly out."

It was hardly chilly for January, but I supposed it was a bit damp. Even when I closed the window, Kyle kept trembling. So much we weren't really discussing. Then again, I was hardly eager.

XXX

Clyde's funeral was the next week, a Saturday afternoon. Kyle did not bother with a taxi, choosing instead to call a car that picked us up from his flat and drove us to Clerkenwell Green. This was gratuitous, totally absurd, and yet I did not argue. I could not decide if indulging all of Kyle's urges for creature comforts was going to be his undoing, or not. He should be happy, I felt, so satisfied that his life was something worth living. At the same time, though, I wondered if perhaps humanizing him — insisting we take the bus, treating him as if nothing extenuating was at play — would remind both of us that he was not actively dying. I was too weary to argue, which was the deciding factor.

The morning before, Kyle had called me from work and told me to wear the clothes he'd bought me a few weeks before, to go to dinner with Token and Wendy. Staring at myself dressed in his vanity mirror, I wanted to rip them off, light them on fire, throw them off the balcony. My entire life I had liked nice things if I could have them, and now these corduroy trousers just felt binding and scratchy to me.

The funeral was in a small Anglican church with a lush, decrepit yard, high iron fences and brick retaining walls on all sides. The steeple was the highest thing in the near vicinity, towering over the "green," a compact asphalt knot of streets lines with coffee shops and studios, a former radical hotbed. It felt both right and inappropriate for Clyde's funeral. Mr. and Mrs. Donovan had their son cremated, and his tainted ashes sat in an urn on the pulpit. The place was bloody packed. "Who the hell _are_ most of these people?" I asked Kyle. We chose to sit in the back so he could rest his head on my shoulder while we chatted idly instead of paying attention.

"I don't know." Before the service began the room was just buzzing, Clyde's miserable parents receiving guests who patted them on their shoulders without a word of condolence. "From eavesdropping a bit I believe that lady over there" — Kyle used his shoulder to single out a weeping old maid with a streaky bun — "is his secretary. Well, _was_. You know." He sighed, and laid his head back against me. "Do you think Caroline would cry at my funeral?"

"What a silly thing to consider." In my mind, I was certain I'd be too wracked with sobs to take notice of who would even attend Kyle's funeral. It also occurred to me that I hadn't any concept of a Jewish funeral — did they cremate? Who delivered the eulogy? Would I be able to do it? Would I _have_ to do it? I was about to ask him, and then Butters arrived.

"Oh, my gosh," he said. He was wearing an old black suit that was too small for him and he looked about ready to tear the whole thing off. "I was worried I'd be late."

"I wouldn't have worried," Kyle said. "If I were you, I wouldn't have come."

"Oh, but I never disliked Clyde." Butters took a seat next to us, forcing me to shove down the pew. "All those English tutorials, you know. I remember him struggling to come up with things to say. Do you remember that class on Georgics and pastorals? When Garrison asked Clyde to compare _The Ecologues_ to Spencer? And he went off for about 20 minutes on _The Faerie Queen_ and after he finished he stammered, 'Well, and that's _The Faerie Queen_,' — and I swear to god, Kyle, you turned to him and said, 'Yes, it certainly is' and the entire room erupted in laugher."

"No," I said.

"Yes," said Kyle, "but that's really more of a story about me than about Clyde, isn't it?"

"Oh." Butters blushed, working his thumbs together in a nervous way. "I suppose it is."

"Maybe you can tell it at _my_ funeral."

"Oh, no. Kyle, I'm sorry, I completely forgot to say — you look excellent."

Kyle rolled his eyes. "You mean for one of the walking dead? Yes, well, rigor mortis hasn't settled in, I suppose — _yet_. It won't be pretty at the end, though, we were _in the room_ with Clyde—"

"You mean, at his bedside?"

"Yes, in hospital, Stanley and I — apparently he wanted me there, although he wasn't conscious or anything, maybe it was meaningful. Perhaps that can be my last calling, bringing comfort to ex-lovers at death's door. That sounds like me, Stanley, doesn't it?"

The very conversation was driving me mad, alternating wills to stand up and march out, or just burst into tears. I hadn't cried at all — it wasn't in my nature to do so. But this church full of grieving old people was only causing me to dwell on Kyle, the way his skin felt clammy and his intravenous puncture wounds were scabbing over in the crooks of his arms. "Yes," I managed, hating myself for feeling anything near sadness at Old Clyde's damn funeral. "Exactly like you."

Token and Craig delivered eulogies — Craig's officious, Token's sentimental. Craig praised Clyde's service to the British Empire, the model civil servant, a good friend to have when one needed a visa for some hothouse African equatorial province in a pinch. Once they went on safari. I hadn't known that, but it made total sense. All of Craig's poor children and his long-suffering wife trapped in a jeep on some grassy tundra with Clyde Donovan — it must have been great fun to grow up in _that_ household.

Token's eulogy, by contrast, was almost sweet. "The most caring, deeply loving man I've ever known," he said, speaking in generalities. It made me wonder if perhaps Token had never fallen for Craig because he was in love with Clyde. Then I wondered why I cared. Wendy was sitting in the front, beside her husband, and every time the organ broke into a hymn, she looked back at me to offer a wan smile.

After the service, there was a small reception in the yard behind the church. The girl Rebecca stood there crying, utterly alone. There was weak punch in plastic bowls, and Clyde's parents sat in folding chairs, his mother holding his ashes, shaking her head. "This seems wrong," I said to Kyle and Butters, looking around at the scene before me. "That girl is really distraught."

"She should be distraught," said Kyle. "She's a gold-digging whore and her closeted meal ticket's died from AIDS. That would ruin anyone's day."

"Oh, this is awful." Butters covered his ears with his hands. "That poor, poor girl."

"But do you think she even knew?" I asked. "Have some sympathy, Kyle."

"I'm hungry. Can we go, please?"

"Well, I don't mean to be rude, but it's been a long day," Butters said. "Perhaps some food is in order."

"There are palmiers," I said, and there were — on silver trays, next to the punch.

"I need real food. I'm not going to stand in a churchyard eating palmiers."

"Fine." I handed my plastic cup of punch to Kyle, and said, "We'll get something to eat, but first I need to say goodbye to Wendy."

She was standing under an oak tree, drinking punch and reading the memorial pamphlet. _Clyde Donovan_, it said on the front, with a big picture of Clyde at about age 30, smiling in a turtleneck sweater, _10 April 1946 – 27 January 1986_. "What a nice service," she said as I came over. "Don't you think?"

"It was fine."

"I almost didn't come this morning. I didn't sleep at all last night. I thought getting full-time help would mean I slept more, but there's something about keeping a baby in the house that deters one from resting. Oh, and Token was up all night, writing his eulogy. He was so nervous, he read it to me six times over breakfast."

"I wish you'd told him to remove the part about Clyde being the most loving man in Britain."

"Why? That's how Token felt."

"Clyde was the most boring man in Britain — I mean, but everyone knows that already."

"Some people really liked him! Look, you cannot just — you can't just camp your way through this funeral. A man is dead, Stanley, you mustn't act so disaffected. What if it was someone you cared about?"

"Well, it wasn't," I snapped. "Listen, we're leaving. Give my love to the baby."

"And give mine to Kyle."

"Oh, you love him now?"

"No, but I'm afraid if I seem uncaring, his needy, existential angst will prevent you from having your way."

I declined to tell her that I hadn't gotten my way for several weeks, for reasons she couldn't begin to fathom. Not that it was really on my mind. Kyle and I hadn't discussed sex at all for a week. He had been sweating at night, soaking through pajamas and sheets and into the mattress. He didn't complain, just got up and washed his hair, then stroked it into complicity. His body seemed the same as it had always been — pale, well-tended, graceful and long. It was odd to think, suddenly in this churchyard, that his body might be changing. Already there were puncture wounds and bruises where he'd been jabbed in hospital.

"And you still owe me a dinner date!" she chided. "I want to have dinner at the club, Stanley, you and Kyle owe me an engagement—"

"Fine, Wendy, we will. Yes." I kissed Wendy goodbye on the cheek, and wished she'd forget about going to her club. I couldn't bear to put these fussy clothes on again and act as though everything was all right, that life was so manageable that I could stand to sit for two hours in someone's precious club.

I made one more stop before leaving. The girl Rebecca was distraught, and alone, so I made a point of going to her and offering my condolences. "You're so kind!" she wailed, falling into my arms. I held her, standing there, with Kyle glaring at me across the courtyard. I shrugged at him. What could I do? All of her weight was resting on me, her big fake breasts pressed to my front, while she sobbed, "I love him, I love him." Had he loved her? I couldn't imagine it. Maybe her love made him feel potent, important, _normal_. Maybe he loved her, and his premature death spared her all the anguish she'd have had later, when that love crumbled around them in middle age, like the brittle shell of a macaron. Maybe there were so many types of love, and Clyde was unable to reciprocate that which he won with his despicable personality. It didn't matter to me, and I began to wish she'd get off of me. When she finally did, she mumbled a brief, "Thank you," and slunk off, still crying. I pitied that girl, and hoped she'd live long enough to forget about Clyde.

XXX

Sitting down to lunch, I turned to Butters and said, "So, I see Eric found it too trying to make it to the funeral."

"Making good on what he said last week," Kyle remembered.

Butters looked up from his place setting and sighed. "I did ask him to come. He seems to feel Clyde wasn't worth his time. No one forces Eric Cartman to adhere to their own agenda." Poor Butters was looking haggard, and he yawned into his menu. "Excuse me. It's just been such an emotionally draining week."

Kyle was tapping his fingers against the white tablecloth, scanning the café for a waitress and a menu. "I didn't realize you were so fond of old Clyde, Miss B," he said, straining to get the attention of a server at the next table without seeming impatient.

"You know I wasn't." Butters had taken his suit jacket off and was rolling his blue checked sleeves up to his elbows, careful and precise. "Two funerals in a week, though, it's an awful lot of funerals."

"I'm so sorry, Butters." Kyle finally stopped looking for a server's attention and turned to stare across the table at Butters. He grabbed Butters' hand and clasped it. "I'm so sorry. Who died?"

"My father."

"Oh my god!" Kyle dropped Butters' hand now. "I had no idea!"

"Yes, he died." Butters rolled his eyes. "He died last week. Stanley was there when I learned. He—"

"You knew?" Kyle turned to me, eyebrows arching. "You _knew_ her father died and you didn't _tell_ me?"

"I'm sorry," I said, feeling the barest amount of regret. "I came to see you and then we went to hospital and Clyde, you know, it's just — I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Miss B. Are you quite all right?"

Butters was about to answer when our waiter came with menus. He shrugged and said, "Let's talk about it after ordering," paging through to the beverages, the liquor list. "I was going to have a coffee, but I think I'm in a more celebratory mood. Would it be disrespectful to Clyde to have a bottle of champagne? Would you boys share it with me?"

"What are we celebrating?" I asked.

"My father's timely death, of course," Butters said.

"Miss B!" Kyle gasped through a slight smile. "That's so rotten of you."

Butters' menu snapped shut. "Is it rotten? Gosh, I'm sorry, I don't mean to be horrible. I don't need to toast his death, but I _am_ celebrating my reunion with my mother. Is that all right?"

I stared at Butters in confusion, trying to pick out the tone in his voice. "Miss B, are you being sarcastic?"

"What? No, of course not. Gosh, I'm sorry, I really am sorry. Am I ruining things? I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I just don't—"

"Butters." Kyle grabbed one of Butters' wrists, and clasped his hand again. "It's quite all right."

"What's all right?"

"Whatever you're feeling," said Kyle. "It's perfectly good. Go on. Order champagne."

And so we did. Kyle had a plate of artichoke heart with clarified butter and a bowl of minestrone soup; Butters ordered linguine with clams, and I felt that was best suited to the dry, ripe champagne we were drinking. I had a bacon avocado sandwich served open-face, on very thick, toasted egg bread, drizzled in a syrupy balsamic; the toast itself was slathered in thick gobs of mayo and carpeted with rocket, a dismal mess of a sandwich. My hunger compelled me to eat, though. Palmiers hadn't been enough. Yet the champagne was bitter in my mouth, stinging as it went down. I decided I didn't care and had a second glass, and a third.

Twirling a clutch of linguine around his fork, Butters looked at the bottle and said, "I think we'd best have another."

"Yes," I said. "This one's on me."

"Yes," Kyle said. "For Clyde."

"For old Clyde," I agreed.

When the second bottle arrived, the waitress opened it and we clinked our glasses together. This was a cheaper bottle, cheaper and older, and I found it less effervescent. It went down easier.

"Shall we share fond memories of Clyde?" I was drunk, drunk enough to ask such an inane question.

"He once came to a show I was performing," said Butters. "With Token. I was touched by that, at the time. I felt it so significant, so gracious of him. Later I learned he wanted me, which I suppose is flattering in a different way, but less flattering all the same. I had no idea at the time, none at all, and I'm not sure where I heard it. Was it from Eric? One of you?"

"We might have told you, yes," Kyle confirmed, stirring and sniffing (but not quite finding it in himself to finish) his minestrone. "I think Token told us, he said something about you — my god, _yes_, it was last year, wasn't it, last year at Camp—"

"That was three years ago," I said. "Or two, I don't remember, I can't count."

"I don't remember much at all, I must have been—"

"You were inebriated, let's say, darling, and you burst it out in front of Dougie. I went home with you that night. August, 1982."

"How do you remember those things with such precision?" Butters asked.

"Yes," Kyle echoed. "How?"

Because it was right after Gary died, and I remembered all the things I felt for him so sharply, the unease of forgetting he'd existed, then forgetting that he'd died. Because Kyle took me to Islington to have dinner with his parents, and Ike was there. Because Ike was so infrequently there before he moved back to London, his disdain for me was crippling and that was the night he announced his engagement, to no one's great joy but Kyle's, not even his own. Because it was the night after Kyle coaxed a tense confession of love from me. Because we'd fucked that previous evening, and when I awoke in the morning with my heart in my throat he was just downstairs, cooking me breakfast. Why wouldn't I remember it?

"I've a good memory," I said. "I know these things."

Butters finished chewing his mouthful of linguine before saying, "Yes, well, I suppose that's my fondest memory of Clyde. That and _Fairy Queen_, but as you so rightly point out, Kyle, it's got little enough to do with him."

Kyle said, "Right."

"So what's your favorite memory of Clyde?" I asked.

"What?" Kyle flushed, his fingers tensing on his bread knife. "Oh, I have so many."

"But just pick one for us," I said.

"Yes, I'd like to hear." Butters sat up straighter, and leaned conspiratorially over the table. "You can cover Stanley's ears, if you like. I'm very interested."

"Oh, you know Clyde and I," Kyle said, trying to decide whether to put his butter knife down on his plate or to set it on the table. He kept moving it back and forth, nervous, unsure where to look or how to handle this question. "We have such an unusual history, I'm hardly mourning him, but I wouldn't wish — I can't conceive…" Of dying the same way, emaciated and confused, barely conscious, skin scabbing over with lesions. Kyle's voice began to tremble, and he began to shake: "He wasn't a bad fellow, obviously, he wasn't so bad to me. Clyde never hurt anyone. He didn't deserve to be broken like that."

"Darling," I said. "You needn't continue."

"But I want to." Kyle moved his butter knife to the edge of his artichoke plate. "My favorite memory of Clyde is this: There was a night once when I was feeling lonely; I think I'd been left. It was that, that Frenchman—"

"Christophe," Butters supplied.

"Yes, Miss B. Christophe, he left me. He stole my silver! Very upsetting. I went down to the pub to confront him and found him with another man. The nerve, do you know? I was — well, I was distraught. So I went home via Avondale Park. It's out of the way, of course, but I needed to think. I certainly wasn't cottaging there, and I wasn't in the mood for anything, either, but I just sort of … ran into him there. Clyde, I mean. He started asking me about whether I spent much time in Avondale Park, I said no, it was dark out, might he walk me home, and before we'd even left the park, he was sort of, sort of … touching my back. I remember thinking, is this some sort of signal? I never take chances like that, but I turned around and asked, 'Are you alone, Clyde?' In my huskiest voice, do you know?" Kyle lowered his voice, and said a very deep-throated, "_Like this, do you know? Are you … .alone?_" He cleared his throat before continuing: "And he sort of grabbed my hand and led me sort of behind some bushes, where he said, 'I want to show you something.' So I knelt down—"

"_Kyle_."

"—and, and sort of … felt out this _massive_ thing. This massive, purple thing, it was glorious, I don't use the word glorious lightly, but to have seen this thing, Stanley. Miss B. It was … I just put it in my mouth right there."

"Kyle_, please_."

"Once he was hard, I didn't waste a moment. I just dropped down on all fours, and let him have me right in the bushes." Kyle put his elbows on the table, ears in his hands, shaking his head. "He was so _bad_ at it, it was just pathetic. But I was in ecstasy, panting on my knees, thinking to myself, 'Broflovski, you imbecile, you'll never find a man like this again, he's a statistical impossibility. He'll ruin you, utterly ruin you, he'll stretch you out, no man could ever want you again after you've been with this horse, this utter _beast_.' My sleeves were rolled to my elbows and I felt my elbows pushing into the mud, it was so _rainy_ that summer, and the grass streaking on my rolled-up sleeves and the waist of my trousers cutting into my thighs. He was big, so impossibly big. Before I knew what was happening I was just climaxing all over myself, face in the mud. I remember thinking that if he kept going I would come again, and again, and I didn't care how stretched out I got, so long as I kept coming like that. But before I could, it was over, he fell on top of me. He said, 'Cheers, that was brilliant.' I was sitting there in the mud, covered in come and mud, my thighs smeared with it, my cheeks covered in bits of grass. I said, 'Would you walk me home, Clyde?'

"And he looked down at me, and I saw his face sort of fall from this triumphant smirk of conquer into a crestfallen _Oh, right, this thing is still lying in the mud in front of me_. One of those bitter realizations, as if watching something die in front of your face, the shock and displeasure mingling. And he said to me, he said … he said, 'I have to go.' And he went, and I walked home myself, with mud on my trousers and my pants perfectly ruined. Took a shower, washed myself out, got in bed.

"For a time I was so disappointed. And then, for a time I felt perhaps if I just _loved_ him, tried to show him another man could love him — but I learned very quickly that wasn't Clyde. Old Clyde … for a while I told myself I wasn't like him, that the pain I felt others did to me, but he caused his own anguish, he kept himself miserable. Then I saw him with that Page Three girl — do you recall, Stanley? … _Stanley_?"

I hadn't realized he was paying attention to me whilst he was speaking. "Yes," I said, "of course. That was … very distracting."

"Well, who does that?" Kyle shrugged. "More than we realize, I think."

"I thought we knew them all," Butters said. "I thought that was the point."

"Mmm, I don't know." Kyle's mood seemed to lift as he spoke, dipping his spoon back into his soup, stirring the bits of pasta and tomato around the congealing broth, creating a whorl at the center of the footed bowl. "I like to think I harbor a rather sensitive and accurate ability, and yet I'm not sure I would have known about old Clyde, you know, had I not known him in his youth, for years—"

"Crossed his path in Avondale Park," I interjected. Although I was not done with my sandwich, and had not eaten anything more all day than a palmier or two, I was quickly losing my appetite.

Butters shot me a sympathetic look.

Kyle wasn't looking at me, but eyeing his soup as if he were trying to will himself to eat some. Soups with pastas and beans and other starchy things becomes clumpy if left to sit, and I tried to tell myself that Kyle was debating his enthusiasm for consuming mush. But that was hypocritical; I no longer wanted to eat, either. Suddenly, I hated this meal, hated being here, hated Clyde, hated that he'd been so selfish as to die.

"Oh, this is exhausting," Kyle said. He rubbed his temples, and I wondered if he had a headache, or was similarly frustrated with the conversation. "I'm sorry, this is too much. Clyde's not worth this much angst. He never was. Miss B — tell me about your father."

Butters seemed surprised. "Why?" he asked. "What do you want to know?"

"I don't know," said Kyle. "You have my condolences, really. I wish I'd known; I would have tried to be there for you. Is there anything I can do?"

"What? Oh, no, gosh, _no_, I'm fine. Pleased, really. He was such an unpleasant person, and we never got along. Long before he suspected me of having 'inclinations' " — he made inverted commas with his fingers — "he was hard on me. I was made to do absurd things, rearranging the pantry items in compulsive order, digging holes and made to refill them. Maybe he suspected. Maybe he was trying to work it out of me. I don't know. He was in the war, you know, at Normandy. He had a very militaristic outlook. I was always disciplined, confined to my room." Butters sighed. "Well, he's dead now. We've never had a relationship to speak of. And I hadn't seen him since 1967, when I told him I was moving to London with Bradley. … That felt good, actually, perhaps that was the finest hour of my life. My great triumph."

"That's so horrible," Kyle said. "I'm so sorry. I don't know what I would have done if that had happened to me."

"It's all right," Butters replied. "I had the love of a good man. That was well enough for me."

"I'm very sorry, Butters," Kyle repeated. "Really, truly."

"There's really no need to be sorry. I'm glad he's dead. It's brought me back in touch with my mother, actually, which is enough for me. I was just in Durham for a bit and I … well, I sort of enjoyed it. I had a difficult time deciding between whether to spite the old bastard by bringing Dougie with, or just leaving him here. So, I left him here. It was nice to get a break from Douglas, and my mother and Desdemona got on famously. She'll come down here and visit me, I believe. It's not perfect, of course, but I think things are healing a bit."

"Aren't you sad at all?" I asked.

"No."

"Not even a little?" Kyle said.

"No, not even a little. The whole thing was wonderfully pleasant. Exhausting, grueling, but cathartic and good all the same. Don't you know what that's like?"

Thinking of my birthday, I nodded. "Yes, I do."

Kyle nudged my calf under the table with his wingtip. "You've been very quiet today, Stanley. Penny for your thoughts?"

"I should require at least two pennies," I said, not wanting to sit at the table for hours, gossiping idly, discussing funerals and their guests of honor.

Rolling his eyes, Kyle slouched down to reach into his pocket, laying on the table a two-pence piece. "Here."

I looked at it. "Thanks"

"Well?"

I rolled my eyes, and crossed my arms tighter, lower on my torso. "Everyone is somehow wounded. I've no love for Clyde, but why must we sit here discussing him? I've greater concerns."

"Ah, your _great concerns_," Kyle said in a tone of mocking. He pushed the coin toward me. "Go on, dear. Give me something to work with."

"I don't like being put on the spot. Get your two pence away from me. Clyde doesn't care if he had you. He's dead and I hate that we're talking about him."

"What about Miss B's father?" Kyle asked.

I stood up, tired of sitting after the hired cars and churches and late luncheons. "I'm truly, truly sorry," I said to Butters, not even sparing one glance toward Kyle. "Either that he's dead or that he's dead and he treated you so miserably that you seemingly feel nothing. Either, or both, I'm not sure. Also, that I never mentioned it to Kyle. I think you can understand that I'm reasonably distracted of late."

"Of course," said Butters.

Kyle said nothing.

"I'll settle the check."

"Oh, you don't have to," I heard Butters say as I sought out our server. I paid what we owed with a charge card, wondering what would happen to Clyde's money, if it would default into his parents' accounts, and what would happen to Kyle's money, what would happen to Kyle's flat. As I signed my name, it occurred to me that I was lucky to have my own place to live, and more certain that I should hold onto my home with a tight grip.

Much later that evening, we were curled together in bed, Kyle and I, listening to the radio and not doing much of anything. Inside it was balmy, the heater gurgling at full-blast, inefficient. Kyle was sweating in my arms, his skin sticky in my hands, but I didn't flinch or complain, just content to be with him. He said he was cold despite the warmth, the bedclothes, an old sweater over his kimono, and I was inclined to believe him. But he sat up, peeling off the damp sweater. It was navy cable-knit cotton, not at all his style. "This is Clyde's, you know," he said, leaning over to switch the radio off. "Does that bother you?"

It did, a bit. A lot, actually. "Not really," I said. "Why, are you wearing it for sentimental reasons?"

"No." He shrugged, slipping it over his head and down his lean arms. "It's a coincidence, actually. I never realized he left it here until I was looking for something recently that I wouldn't mind perspiring on." He huddled down beside me, yawning, his eyes heavy.

"Should I be worried about you?" I asked, as if I weren't already.

Quickly, he said, "No," and then he paused. "Well, yes, I mean, you should, probably," he corrected. "Generally, I mean. Not necessarily in this moment specifically. I'm not presently ill. I'll be all right. I think when I'm dying, we'll know."

The thought horrified me. "Well, how are we going to know that, darling?"

"If I'm distressed, I think I should inform you. Yes, if I'm in pain I'll be insufferable. All right?"

"Yes. Splendid."

"Would you be a dear and turn off the light?"

I reached over for the chain on Kyle's porcelain vase-pedestal lamp, pastoral scene of a suitor in powdered wig handing a flower to a girl in a cream-puff dress, obliging demurely. It was a kitschy sort of thing, and it went out with a bit of a pop. The room was dark now, Kyle's wet hair tucked under my chin, and all the traffic of Holland Park Road audible even in the distance. It was only 10 p.m., or maybe it was later. Kyle's electronic alarm clock was on his side of the bed. There was no way of knowing.

He murmured something against my chest.

I asked, "What's that?"

"I said, I'm sorry for all that … talk of Clyde earlier." The wet silk of the kimono bunched on my chest beneath his arms.

"It's all right, darling. It's nothing."

"So we're not mourning his loss, all right, I think we're both fine with that."

"I'm fine with it."

"But surely you must be angry, dear, I mean — I shouldn't bring up all these ex-lovers of mine. It's cruel to you."

"How is it cruel to me?" I asked.

"Doesn't it bother you at all," he pressed, his fingers boring deeper into my flesh, "that other men have had me? Just a bit?"

"Yes." I don't know why I was honest with him this time. Perhaps I was tired, too tired to unwind the difficult threads of his tangled heart. "All right, Kyle, _yes_, it bothers me, the thought of any other man having you bothers me. I didn't like to think of it then and I don't like to think of it now. But what would you have me do, seek them all out for vengeance? Sob about it? Console myself with the number of men _I've_ been with?"

"No!"

I was surprised that his reaction was so sudden and emphatic. "That's just as well, then. I may have seen the insides of my share of toilets, but I can count the number of meaningful relationships I've had on half a hand. Is that better? To have fucked prodigiously, and loved seldom?"

"It's better to have had very satisfying sex," Kyle said.

This intrigued me. "Oh? And the sex you had with Clyde that evening, in Avondale Park, was that satisfying?"

Against my chest, Kyle shook his head. "No. Oh, Stanley, _no_. He had a big cock, but that was all. It didn't mean anything. It meant _nothing_. I wanted it to, of course, because I don't — I don't want to be _that _person, you know."

"What kind of person?"

"You know." Kyle's eyes shut, and not from tiredness; this much I could tell in the dark. "The kind of person who has very degrading, very unsatisfying sex, just trying to will it into something better. At school, they called me a, well … they called me many horrid things." He paused to sigh, and I felt his breath against my flesh. "They called me a whore, you know, at first I didn't know what it meant. I looked it up in the OED. And I felt they were right, at least in the abstract, because I knew it meant some kind of trade woman, the lowest thing you could be. And that was what I felt like. With Clyde, though — with Clyde, that was dispiritingly whorish. Because I was giving myself to him for a price, validation or whatever."

"But isn't that all sex ever is?" I asked.

"No, with you, sex is special, dear. Please believe me."

"Is it very satisfying?"

"Yes," he hissed. Now his eyes were shut tight, but his words sounded wet. "Emotionally and physically. When you fuck me it's divine, like sitting on a throne of glory."

"But you don't use the word 'glorious' easily," I replied.

"No," said Kyle. "I don't.

XXX

A couple of weeks later I was spending a Saturday night with Kyle. He made a heavy lasagna with a white wine-cream sauce, the layers of pasta hiding spinach and seafood, shreds of scallop, squid, clam, and late winter Scottish cold-water salmon. I'd never had such a dish before, and marveled at its richness. Kyle dismissed my compliments, though. "It's nothing," he said, sealing the leftovers in the casserole dish with cling wrap, presumably to finish later in the week. Maybe we'd eat it the next day for lunch. "My mother would kill me for making this. It's so Italian, do you know? The entire thing is so antithetical to Jewish food. Well, except that it's fattening. I mean, this entire thing would be outright forbidden. Can you imagine?"

I didn't much care if it was fattening _or_ antithetical to Jewish food. I could very well imagine, yet I didn't care to. It had been a while since we'd seen Kyle's family, before the new year, even, and although I knew he was speaking on the phone with his mother on a regular basis, I was in no rush to lie to them about Kyle's illness to their faces. The lasagna was magnificent and I praised Kyle's cooking skills highly. He flushed with pleasure at my compliments and we got in bed early, just to lie together and talk.

"The last few days have been so excellent," he said, yawning into my shoulder as he held me from behind. "I'd enjoy a life of lazy Saturdays like this one."

"I wish you'd quit working, then." This was the most forward thing I'd said to him about his mortality in a week or two, and it was weak and indirect, my voice stinging with possessiveness. I didn't want to share him with anyone anymore, I'd decided. Why couldn't it be just the two of us forever? As soon as I said it I realized I'd get up in the morning and go home alone to my flat, to work for hours on end, typing up a review of the Barbican production of _Le Liaisons Dangereuses_. I'd taken Kyle when I'd gone to see it the night before, and I remembered my notes next to the typewriter, all the way back in Hoxton. Suddenly I felt lonely without them, so far from my work, but I took solace in his arms around me, the way I felt his chest expanding against my back. That's how we fell asleep.

At 7 the next morning I was awoken by the phone ringing in my ear, to a mouthful of Kyle's hair. The night before was so calm and pointless; Kyle had fallen asleep before I did. He was exhausted, poor Kyle. He rolled over, away from me and the sound of the ringing phone. Not wanting him to wake, I spit hair out of my mouth and answered with a groggy, "hello?"

It was Ike. "Is Kyle there?" he asked immediately.

"Well, good morning," I replied. "Yes, he's here; he's asleep." I was whispering.

"Well, okay." Ike paused for a moment, then commanded: "Wake him up."

"Um." I looked down at sleeping Kyle, his breathing rhythmic and his hair an absolute mess. "I don't know if I should."

"Oh, for the love of Christ! I've had a baby. Well, I haven't, but Flora has. I want to tell him he's an uncle. So wake him up and put him on the phone."

"Congratulations!"

"Godammit, _Stanley_, put Kyle on."

So I nudged Kyle until he rolled over, yawned, and looked up at me. "Oh," he said, glancing at the alarm clock. "But it's only 7."

"It's your brother," I informed him, handing over the receiver.

And just like that, a smile appeared on his face. Sitting up, he was beaming. "Oh, that's wonderful! What's the name?"

The conversation was short, and Kyle handed the phone back to me to replace on the nightstand. "I've a little nephew," he announced, lying back down next to me. "Winston, apparently. Winston Broflovski. They haven't decided on a middle name, if any. Silly name, don't you think? So very Ike-ish, to name it after Churchill. Predictable. Oh well."

"That's a miserable name," I agreed, settling in against him. The flat was cold but Kyle's body was so hot and sticky; he sweated buckets in his sleep, soaking the bedclothes and my pajamas.

He couldn't lie in bed for long, even tired and queasy; the news excited him to action and I lay in bed watching him dash around, showering and drying his hair; buttoning up a shirt, then a waistcoat.

"I haven't seen my mother in so long," he said. "I've got to seem passable. How do I look?"

"Excellent," I said, my face buried in a stack of pillows. "Beautiful."

"I'm hoping she won't be cross with me for being so scarce."

"Say you've been working," I suggested.

"It's not good enough!"

"Maybe she won't be there."

He sat down at the vanity, pulling on his argyle wool socks, sunny yellow and lavender with white details. Even with the ever-burgeoning popularity of pastels and floral prints, no respectable straight man would wear those socks in thick wool, in mid-winter. "Of course she'll _be_ there. My parents are likely to have been there for hours already. It's their first grandchild." He paused to reach for a pair of light gray brogues, biting his lip. "I hope their joy distracts from my presence."

Only Kyle could make the birth of his brother's first child somehow all about himself. If Ike went on to have myriad children, perhaps he'd internalize the role he played in this: utterly nothing.

He sat down on the edge of the bed, right next to me, running his fingers through my messy hair, brushing it from my eyes. "You need a haircut," he said. "Do you want to come with me to see Evelyn? I really think—"

"No thank you."

"Well, all right." He stood back up, the mattress reverting to its pre-Kyle structure and firmness. "I don't know how long I'll be. Will you be here when I return?"

"I think that depends on when you return."

"I think I'll go home and write, then."

"I wish you wouldn't say that."

"Say what?" I asked.

"Well, I wish you wouldn't do that," he replied. "Can't you write here?"

"Well, no. You haven't got a typewriter."

"I've a word processor!" he insisted. "And I do so have a typewriter, an old Smith-Corona. It's portable, put away in a closet, I think—"

"Forget it," I said. "My notes are at home."

"You're impossible, Stanley!" He sat back down on the edge of the bed, his fingers back in my hair. "The bris will be eight days from now. I expect you'll be my plus-one."

"I don't know what that is, but of course I'll be your plus-one."

"As it should be. Sit up and give me a farewell kiss." He closed his eyes and pouted his lips at me.

I sat up and kissed him. "It's too early and I'm going back to bed." I lay back down, pulling the quilt back over my head.

"I'll ring you later, dear, with the full report." I didn't hear him go.

XXX

Not knowing what a _bris_ was, I went along to one quite willingly. It was only in the taxi to Kyle's parents' the next weekend that I learned the ritual involved something more than symbolic gestures and prayer. I had been fiddling with my trainers, trying to double-knot the laces, while Kyle explained it to me. I all but pulled my shoe off and threw it at him.

"They're going to _what_?"

"Don't be _shocked_," he said, seeming more annoyed than anything. "I know you're familiar with circumcision."

"In theory!" I protested. "There is a marked difference between an encounter with a naked prick, _already shorn_, and forcing me to watch one be ripped off a baby!"

"Well, when do you think they should do it?" Kyle asked. "In Islam they do it at 13. Or, how would you like to have it done right now? Better to do it in early infancy when he can't feel it."

"Of course he'll feel it! Do you think babies don't have pain receptors?"

"They'll anaesthetize him—"

"Thank god."

"—with wine."

"What!" Now I really felt bad for poor Winston. I hadn't even met him yet; he was eight days old and I couldn't help wondering about his foreskinless future with these people. "That's not a devotional gesture, darling. It's cruel!"

"You only think it's cruel because you're imaging what it might be like to experience it yourself, with only a thimbleful of wine to distract you."

"I think it's cruel because I've spent enough time around howling infants to know that they are ill-prepared to handle pain."

"It'll be six minutes of his early life and then he'll be well past it, forever," Kyle said, waving his hands in front of him, as if to banish the thought of pain from our conversation. "I've had mine done for 30 years now and it doesn't bother me at all."

"It's been 40 years, you mean," I said, thinking of his birthday in late May.

"Yes, well." Kyle sniffed. "I'm used to rounding down. Seeing as I'll never have anything to round up to."

I refused to indulge his self-pity. "I am only saying that six minutes for you or I is fleeting, and six minutes for an eight-day-old infant is a significant amount of time."

"Don't say another thing to me until we get to my parents' house," he snapped. "I'm going to spend the rest of the ride concentrating on keeping my breakfast down." He managed that, at least.

I was used to the Broflovski house swarming with people; often I recognized none of them. They entertained prodigiously, both for political and spiritual circles. Today's gathering was a bit of a mix, but I spied Flora's family and would have followed Kyle to say hello to them, had I not been caught in his mother's web first.

She kissed me on both cheeks. "You look so well, Stan," she said, wiping lipstick smudges from my face with the ball of her hand. "How come I never see you anymore?"

"Oh," I said, "I don't really know. I suppose you'd have to ask Kyle."

"Kyle is so unforthcoming lately! Is something the matter with him? You know you can tell me."

I was dreading having to answer this. "He's all right," I said. "Just swamped with work, of course, utterly swamped. I can barely get his attention." I wondered if embellishing this weren't going too far.

"But surely he could make some time for his mother?"

"Oh, he can hardly make time for me," I replied, figuring this wasn't a lie at all.

She gave me a look that indicated I couldn't compare to her level and sort of import. "It's good of you to come today."

"I've only just learned what a bris _is_…"

She laughed, girlish and condescending. "Oh, they don't even feel it. I have pictures from Kyle's, of course. And Ike's. Ike was so much less of a _thing_, you know, the second child, and he was already circumcised, by the orphanage. So we made something up, you know, Mother" — her mother, I presumed — "didn't even want to fly over. But Kyle! Oh, he was so sweet, such a good boy even so young. He sucked on that towel, you know, so content with something in his mouth."

I chose not to remark on that.

"Anyway." She sighed. "Have you met Winston yet? You should go find him. He's got so much Ike in him. It's touching. I should go talk to the caterers, though, and say hello to—" whoever, and she walked away, mid-sentence, wig threatening to slide off of her head.

Mildly disturbed, I found Kyle conversing with Flora. "There you are!" He waved me over. "Flora, you remember Stanley—"

"Yes," she said, rolling her eyes, heavy and pointed. "I know him. I've known him three years."

This was a vivacious girl, beaten back into a shell of whatever she'd been before marrying Ike and moving to London. The first time she'd been here was the weekend before her wedding for a ritual early in the morning at the synagogue; she'd converted in Manchester, apparently, and the ceremony was at some lovely historic home in Wigan. The drama and pathos of the wedding had been draining for everyone involved; not being involved, I found the entire thing an entertaining farce.

Sheila Broflovski could not help wanting to seize control of things, but Flora's parents were losing their daughter to a new family, a new religion, a new big city far away that she knew nothing about. It had taken so much energy on their parts, especially Flora's, to have the wedding where she wanted and how she wanted; to keep so many Labour ministers out of her reception; to keep from alienating her parents, who had never known a single Jew until their daughter consented to marry one. It was mad, a mad nine-month circus of hurt feelings and subsumed identities. I sat on the sidelines reveling in this comedy of manners, reminding myself of Wendy's frequent rejoinder, _you're so lucky you're gay_. I still didn't think I was lucky, but in a better position to defend myself than Flora was. She certainly resented me.

And I was sure the last thing she wanted was to have her infant ripped from her arms by Kyle.

"Isn't he amazing?" Kyle held the squirming child in his arms, bouncing and shushing him at the same time, whilst Flora stood there looking cross. I imagine on the inside she was fuming. All the mothers I knew were fervently possessive.

"Yes, well," Flora muttered, wringing her hands.

Kyle seemed not to notice. "I do think he's a little bit of me, little Winnie—"

"Ike doesn't like you to call him that," Flora said.

"Oh, but he's precious. Stanley, have you ever seen a more beautiful child?"

I said, "No," mainly out of courtesy.

"He's Ike's little charcoal eyes, of course, and the same black hair—"

"I'd black hair as a baby, and now I'm rather fair," Flora said, tugging at her ponytail, blinking her big, empty green eyes. "I was hoping he'll grow up fair-haired."

"Flora, that's not how genetics works."

"It was just something I was hoping—" She was holding her hands out, reaching for the baby.

But Kyle wasn't ready to give him back. "Do you want to hold him?" he asked me.

I shot him a dubious look. "Oh, I'm horrid with babies," I said.

"But you've all those nieces and nephews," Kyle said, foisting Winston on me; I had no choice but to take hold of him, supporting his head in the crook of my arm.

"And Willa, of course," Kyle added, bracing my wrist. "There you are, Stanley. Be gentle." As if he'd ever held a baby before this one in his life.

"Who's Willa?" Flora asked.

"My goddaughter."

"Oh." She rolled her eyes. I could tell she wanted her son back. She didn't much regard me as anything other than a curiosity anyhow. I'd had enough awkward Friday night dinners at Kyle's parents' to know this, and it didn't bother me.

A crown was forming around us, well-wishers, people I didn't know at all. Winston was squirming, too tired to cry. Or perhaps he'd been subdued already — I didn't know all the specifics of the ceremony. "He's lovely," I said, handing him back to Flora. "You should be very proud."

Relief swept over her features. "Thank you," she said, but it sounded chilly. I wasn't sure whether to attribute this to her general wariness of me, or her maternal instincts.

Kyle shook his head, done with Flora and me for the moment. "I should speak with my mother," he said. "Or play emissary to her guests."

"Of course," I said. "Introduce yourself to as many MPs as possible."

"Let's make a game of it, shall we?"

I declined. "I think a drink is more the game for me," I said, pecking him on the cheek before I went off. Flora gave me an incredulous look, as if I'd caused some offense to her or, worse yet, Winston.

On the way to the open bar, I was caught by Kyle's cousin, also named Kyle. I'd met him before, at Ike's wedding, and elsewhere — but the details of these other encounters escaped me. He snagged me from behind, clamping a hand to my shoulder and saying, "Hello, Stan!" in the most grating, whiniest tone. I had no choice but to turn around and return the greeting. His wife was in tow; she was a mild woman with a rather bleached-looking mess of streaky hair hanging around her shoulders, and the least organic-looking breasts I'd ever seen. Around the dinner table Kyle's mother called her a _shiksa_, which he informed me was Yiddish, and not meant to be derisive. The way I'd heard this word pronounced led me to believe otherwise.

"Hello, long time no see," I said, trying to be warm, and probably failing. "I was just on the hunt for a drink."

"I'll join you," said cousin Kyle, touching his wife's shoulderpad. "Can I get you anything?"

"Oh, just tonic water," she said, revealing a very flat American accent — there was no vigor in her tone. "Or if they have it, a mimosa."

"All right, just a sec. So, I hear you're coming to stay with us?"

It took me a moment to discern where his comments to his wife ended, and his question to me began. "Oh, right, yes," I said. "Well, I don't suppose I knew where we were staying — a hotel might be more suitable—"

"Nonsense! We've got a place in the city. It's lovely. On Central Park West. At 81st. Right across from the museum. It's so easy. And by the subway, too, so you can just get _everywhere_. Of course, it's so crowded down there, I never take the subway, Janie and I drive in for the night if we're going to see something. Do you like theater?"

"I'm a theater critic, actually," I tried to say as we approached the bar, but he was going too quickly.

"Well, we just saw the most wonderful thing, _Sunday in the Park with George_, just the other night. It was brilliant. Well, the first act was brilliant. It's Sondheim, do you know him?"

It took me a moment to realize he was actually pausing to ask me a question. "Ah, well, yes—"

Too late. "What am I talking about? You're a homosexual. So Janie and I came in to see this, we didn't bring the kids. Oh, they would have _hated_ it, it just goes on and on. I mean, the first half's pretty good, it's all about that painting, but in the second half, my got, what is he _doing_, it's some diatribe against modern art or something, and the painting is talking to the main character, who is actually George Seurat, but in 1985, he's a digital media artist or something — it's madness. We saw this thing last year you might like, though, it's _La Cage_ and I didn't care for it. Too campy. But you're a homosexual, you might like it." He finally stopped to take a swill of his drink, a glass of cognac.

I rolled my eyes. "Thanks, right, yeah."

"This is so dry," he said, making a face as he pulled away from his drink. He held the glass under my nose. "Does this seem dry to you?"

I shrugged, reaching for an enticing vintage of whisky.

"Well, what can you do, you don't come to Auntie Sheila's for the open bar. So have you been to New York?"

"No, I—"

"Oh, you'll love it. I hate it sometimes, it's so aggravating. But there's no place like it on Earth. You might find it hard, though, your whole scene's gotten kinda ghastly—"

I raised my eyebrows, my lips on the rim of my drink.

"—all the homosexuals, I mean, it's like all downtown's a graveyard. I was wondering if it'd be like that there, actually. Is it like that here?"

It really took all of my will power not to spit my drink at him. He meant well, I had to tell myself, he meant well and he didn't _know_, he was just insensitive, he didn't know. He couldn't know. He didn't know. "A friend of ours passed away, actually," I said, staring into my glass as I swirled the whisky around. "Just recently. He was 40. Well, shy of 40, he'd have been 40 soon, I suppose."

"I'm sorry," said Kyle's cousin, also named Kyle. "How did he go?"

"You mean, what did he die from? I'm not entirely sure." I'd heard that Clyde had been ill with a kind of meningitis, but I could not be sure that this was what strictly killed him. Had any one thing been responsible for that? "Sometimes these things have a cumulative effect, you know."

"Well, that's a shame! I'm so sorry."

"He wasn't a _good_ friend," I clarified.

"Oh, but that must be so awful. How was he? Was he sick for long?"

"I don't know." Thinking of Wendy's last dinner party, I said, "Well, maybe. I'm not sure. Sickness can be so ill-defined—"

"But you're well, of course."

"I'm fine."

"And Kyle—"

"He's fine. Just right." I hid my scowl of pain behind a drink of whisky.

"Well, that's a relief!" Kyle's cousin pushed his glasses back up his nose. "I guess you'd be all right, over here in England, but Janie and I, we were so worried about Kyle, coming to the city all the time, mingling with those boys."

"Er — pardon, but which boys?"

"Oh, out on Fire Island, they all used to congregate out there in the summer, I mean, _you_ all used to. Although I guess you've never been there. Downtown, that scene. Hamptons for homos. Kyle's gone out there — but I suspect just to visit, I thought maybe he had friends."

Swallowing the rest of my drink, I said, "Well, yes, thanks for the concern — excuse me," and I pushed him aside.

I found Kyle standing in the parlor, holding a glass of what smelled like sweet brandy, waiting for the show the start, and I removed it from his hands. "Oh, did you want a glass?" he asked.

"Boys on Fire Island," I said, taking a sip. It was too floral on my tongue, and I shut my eyes as I swallowed. "I've just had the best conversation with your cousin."

"Oh, that's nothing," he said, taking his drink back, but I could see that he was pink and ashamed. "It's just a nice place to visit in the summer. We should go."

"Go where?" I asked. "Who's left? Darling, everyone's dead over there. Or dying, at the very least."

"Fine," he snapped, shoving me with his shoulder. "You know, you're making me feel lousy. Just — just don't talk to me until after the ceremony."

The ceremony turned out to be horrifying, Winston howling his tiny lungs out. Flora stood by the fireplace with her face in his hands, shaking her head at the scene. A fat old man in a prayer shawl and fraying hat did the carving, while Kyle's father held the shrieking infant. Flora's parents hid behind her, shaking their heads and steadying her by the shoulders. Ike stood with his arms crossed a step behind the ceremony, surveying the whole thing, passionless. When Winston was back in his mother's arms, the most demonstrably Jewish guests began singing and clapping their hands above their heads, and soon a three-piece band was playing in the corner while we helped ourselves to fruit-filled blintzes and slices of dense, dry sponge cake cooked without dairy.

I ate with Kyle at the dining room table, watching him chew very slowly. After eating one of the three blintzes he'd served himself, all stuffed with blueberry compote in thick maroon syrup, he pushed his plate away, grimacing.

"Darling," I said. "What's wrong?"

"Can't eat anymore."

Which I took as cause for alarm. "Are you all right?"

"I'm not — I'm fine, no — I'm going to be sick." Kyle got up from the table and fled before I could even blink. I was left staring at a plate of uneaten blintzes, a mug of pale tea, and a bit of salt beef.

Helping myself to the end of Kyle's salt beef, I got up from the table and stretched. I was doing a fine job of not panicking, which was my first impulse. Instead, I wandered a bit, pausing only to say hello to Kyle's father (who nodded at me, but nothing more), until I found the downstairs loo. It was empty. So I tried upstairs, and found Kyle in his bedroom, or rather, the bedroom he lived in until he left for university, and on occasional summers, but not recently. He was curled up around a pillow.

"Hello," I said, softly shutting the door behind me. "Are you all right?" I assumed he would say he was all right, regardless of whether he was.

Instead he said, "No, I've vomited."

I sat next to him on the bed, and he shifted away to accommodate me. "Darling," I said, stroking his hair. "What are we going to do?" The whole thing was vaguely cinematic, with clean winter light falling in slits against an old writing desk through the shades on the windows. Kyle's mother had not done much with this room after Kyle had gutted it to move to Chelsea with me. The walls were originally a deep purple, but they'd faded a bit over the years and now looked tired or washed-out. There was a fraying antique Oriental that covered the expanse of cold hardwood floors. The room had a very English dimension to it, with low ceilings over the bed (Kyle had always slept it a bed twice as wide as he needed) and a narrow closet, missing a door. The desk, the dressers, the bookshelves — everything had a youthful, stunted proportion to it. Sheila had apparently changed the linens, as I remembered them being flowery and ruffled, and these new ones were just powdery green. They matched Kyle's hair while he lay there, but not his personality. There were scant photos of Kyle and his family, and he'd taken most of his books with him to Chelsea. The ones that remained were innocuous, a Greek dictionary here or a children's novel there, stacked haphazardly. The carpet bore the telltale lines of vacuuming, but I couldn't fathom that anyone used this room. It seemed unfair to me that parents should put effort into creating homes for their children, who would only abandon these efforts in the end. Still, I fondly recalled the afternoons I spent with Kyle in this room reveling in lazy sex, passing back and forth tight-rolled joints, and sharing bottles of inexpensive sherry. We also read aloud passages of Wilde, effecting silly voices and pretending our investment in subtext wasn't ludicrous. If Kyle vomited during that long-past summer, it was from over-indulgence.

Now we sat there, or I sat there and Kyle lay sighing, and the din of the party — heels on wooden floors and a trio plucking at strings, china clinking and an infant wailing — went on below us.

"Stanley," Kyle said, sitting up. "I feel a bit better, but — could you do me a favor and go find my brother?"

I said yes, of course I would, and I kissed him on the lips before going.

"Oh, I must taste terrible," he said, pushing me away as our mouths came apart.

"It doesn't matter," I said, leaving to find Ike. I found him, obviously unhappy to leave his guests, drinking a can of beer and rolling his eyes at my appearance.

"You might recall Stanley Marsh," he said, tilting his Tetley's toward me, "Kyle's lover."

"Mazel tov," a middle-aged man said to me.

"Oh, you don't have to congratulate him, he's not done anything," said Ike.

"Yes, well—" I was trying, and failing, to play things off as if everything was amusing and stupid. "Ike, I'm so sorry. Might we speak for a moment?"

"All right, I guess — Christ." He walked off with his beer, pursing his lips. "This is my party, you know. What is it? Is it — where's Kyle?"

"Upstairs."

"You imbeciles can't manage to keep yourselves in check for three hours, can you?" he said as we climbed up the stairs.

"That's not fair!" I said. "Kyle's not an imbecile, this isn't about behavior, it's as if you're implying that our very presence in your life is annoying—"

At the door, he whipped around and gaped at me. "How did you get into Oxford, again? Never mind, I don't care." He went into the room.

"My father worked there," I said to no one, following him in.

Ike had sat down on the bed, and Kyle had sat up, Ike's hands around his throat. For a moment I felt territorial and wanted to leap at them, but I soon realized that Ike was feeling for something. "Yes, they're nice and swollen," he said, dropping his hands. "Just a bit."

"What is?" I asked.

"His lymph nodes," Ike said. "Kyle, open your mouth."

"I didn't ask for a full exam—"

"I'm not giving you one, _shhh_, just comply. All right, there." Ike peered from a distance. "Well, the light's not the best, but I don't think you have oral candidiasis."

"What are you doing?" I asked.

Ike ignored me. "And no lesions, you say?"

"No, nothing bruisey like that," Kyle said. "Are we done?"

"Christ, _no_, you're so skinny. And hot. Have you been sweating a lot? Or just now that you're here?" Kyle sort of nodded, looking glum. "Ah, that's a shame. You need to put some weight back on. What've you been eating?"

"He hasn't been that hungry," I said.

"What did you eat today?"

"Ah, um, a blintz, but I lost it."

"You need to eat more, Kyle. You need to stuff yourself."

"Oh, I'll just make myself fat, will I?"

"No, you'll be staving off death while you waste away, all right? You have to keep your weight up. Stanley should make you."

"I can't make him do anything he doesn't want to do."

"No, you have to feed him!" Ike said. "Force-feed him if you have to! My lord, _wasting_ will kill him before the lesions. Don't you know anything?"

I shook my head. "I'm not a doctor," I said defiantly.

"Christ, I know." Ike sighed. "Unfortunately for all of us, I'm not sure how much medical training _would _help you in this instance. We don't know that much."

"This is why I don't really want a doctor at all," said Kyle.

"Well, that's not an option either. We still know more than the both of _you_. It almost makes me wish I'd gone into viral pathology, you know, rather than becoming a private clinician. Except I'd hate to work for the NHS. This way I make loads of money. It's really fascinating, though, Kyle. I'm torn between worrying for you, and, well, finding out what happens."

"What happens!" Kyle put his hands over his eyes. "To hell with you! I'm not a science experiment."

"Unfortunately, you are. There are relatively few cases in the U.K. And no one knows much about it anyway! Where'd it come from? We've no clue. How to stall it? We're not sure. There are clinical trials, though, the pharmaceuticals companies will be having a field day. We should get you into one, Kyle. … Yes, I only wish I'd done immunology. It's exciting, you know. And if I went to work in America, or maybe France, I might make a lot."

"Why is it always about money for you?" I asked.

"Because I have a family now," Ike replied, although I suspected he'd have answered the same before he had a family. "Stanley, let's talk across the hall so Kyle can rest."

I looked to Kyle, to see if this was all right. He waved me away. "I'll be fine," he muttered, settling down. "You go talk."

I didn't want to leave him, but Ike dragged me into his old bedroom. The walls were hung with football posters, mostly. Ike seemed to be a fan of Arsenal. I'd had no idea.

"Are you a football fan?" I asked.

He rolled his eyes. "Those are from before I left."

"For uni?"

"You might say that. For a kind of education, anyway."

I understood.

"Listen," Ike said. "Much as it pains me to say this, I think between the two of you, you're the rational one."

"Oh, am I?" I rolled my eyes. "How good of you to care."

"Don't be sarcastic. _This is serious_. He needs a doctor."

"He doesn't seem ill enough for that yet."

"What do you mean 'yet'? Why are you so stupid? God, it's so frustrating, this is what we have to work with. Do you understand how this disease works? It takes a person apart, little by little. So he'll fall ill, you'll worry — and he'll get better. And it will happen again. And again. Until he's barely recovering at all. You cannot _stop_ this — but you can try to delay the inevitable. Have you made plans? Have you been tested?"

"What, me? No, I'm fine."

"Unlikely."

"Unless you can explain to me the benefits of testing, I think I'll pass."

"Peace of mind, I should think. And there are drugs you can take, preventatively. Kyle should be on acyclovir, I think. You might want to get on it as well. It's for herpes—"

I just found that offensive. "We don't have herpes!"

"Well, it's a useful antiviral, maybe it would prove beneficial. I'm just guessing. But feel free to make rash medical decisions based on stigmas, of course, that's usually helpful. Let's see. …. Oh. Ribavarin, you could try that. And possibly get him on an anti-anxiety, maybe Xanax, or antidepressants—"

"God, he's not depressed!" I said. None of these drug names really meant anything to me, but this bedroom prescription was frightening and bothersome. "What's that going to do for him?"

"You don't think a man recently diagnosed with a relatively unknown, incredibly stigmatized disease _who doesn't want anyone to_ _know_ might benefit from anti-anxiety drugs?"

"I think he needs you to be compassionate!"

"Yes, I should be compassionate," Ike said, "because he fell into this mess by being irresponsible—"

"How could anyone be responsible about a disease he's unaware of?"

"—and I tried to tell you! I tried to tell both of you and neither of you listened! And you are asking me to _lie to my parents_ for _who knows_ how long, ad infinitum, about that fact that my older brother, their _only biological child_, is terminally ill?"

"Yes, I suppose so."

"Oh." Ike snorted. "_Just checking_."

"Look," I said, pinching my nose and furrowing my eyebrows. "I agree with you. I think you are essentially correct — lying about this, concealing it, is only going to cause Kyle more trouble. It will probably mean more trouble for all of us, eventually. But what else can I do? He doesn't want them to know, you know, he — he is afraid of _something_."

"I'm sure he is afraid of them finding out he is an irresponsible, promiscuous queer who authored his own demise by being stupid," Ike replied. "But they will find that out eventually, and they may blame you or they may blame him, but I think the only thing worse than losing your first-born child has got be the knowledge that you are being lied to, consciously and determinedly, by everyone who matters to you."

"I think he just wants to avoid hurting them," I argued.

"Tell Kyle I'll help him however I can. After all, I am a doctor. But I think he is being, once again, a stupid, spoiled cow. And you are doing neither him nor yourself any favors by indulging him. Understood?"

"Yes, of course."

"Good. Well, you can rest easy. He's not going to die today." Ike turned and exited the room, probably to go back downstairs. With him gone, I crept back across the hall, trying to ignore the commotion of the fete downstairs. I heard the baby squealing, its cries penetrating my consciousness. Poor Winnie — to have been conceived in such fraught circumstances, into a family of dramatics-addicts.

XXX

A few weeks after Winston's circumcision, Kyle was called upon to babysit. Having never seen Kyle so much as handle an infant previous to his recent role in genital mutilation, I was shocked to hear the request come loud and clear through the answering machine: "I need a babysitter," Ike implored, the sound of his wailing son providing background instrumentation. "Just overnight, really, while we attend a friend's dinner party. I think hiring some teenager would be my first choice, but Flora insists it's better for an infant to be left with family. Although I don't know why she thinks she would _know_. I asked Mom first but she has the inevitable services Saturday night, followed by a constituent function, or — I don't know.

"Do this for me and I'll … actually, I think you should simply out of your instinct for self-preservation, which I assume you can interpret accurately without further detail. I apologize, this is an absurdly long recording. The child needs a bottle or something, I don't know. It's been a very long week. Goodbye. Oh, thank you in advance. And goodbye."

"Well, all right," Kyle said to me after deleting the message. "I think I should do that."

"Oh, darling, _no_," I replied. "Infants are messy and noisy. Didn't you hear it crying in that recording?" I rued the day Kyle decided to purchase an answering machine. It made his life, and mine by extension, ever more complex and irritating. There was no chance of ever being left alone again, and for a moment I mourned silence.

"Oh, but how much trouble could a little baby be in the hands of two capable men?" he asked.

"Oh, Kyle." I sighed. "Oh, _no_."

"Well, how difficult _could_ it be?"

"Have you ever changed a nappy?"

Kyle shook his head.

"Warmed milk? Woken at dawn to the sound of something howling?"

"Yes, once, on holiday in the Hebrides—"

"This is a mistake," I warned. "Leaving either of us, or both of us together, in the care of an infant is a recipe for discord."

"But he's my nephew!" Kyle protested. "An innocent little thing! Besides, I do like to pretend, you know."

"Pretend what?"

He became very quiet, diverting his gaze from mine. "Oh, that — that it could be normal, I suppose. That I could have something to do with a child, or we could, or—" He laughed to himself, shaking his head. "Well, that's just stupid, of course. My brother needs a favor, and he's strongly implying that I had better help him under threat of noncompliance with my wishes. So really, what's the worst thing that could happen?"

"I don't know," I said. "But I hesitate to guess, given that fate has had a way of defying even my capacity to imagine the very worst things recently."

"That's probably for the best," Kyle agreed. "I'll give Ike a ring."

In this case, Kyle proved correct about the relative simplicity of caring for an infant. Which was not to say that it was easy work, or that we slept a full night. Winston did doze for about five hours, which Wendy later told me was quite good for a baby — but then, he woke demanding to be held and coddled, changed and fed. Winston was soft and docile, not at all like Willa had been a few months previous, all screeching and howling, if Wendy's reports were to be believed. When Kyle rocked him and cooed, "Winnie, oh _Winnie_," it made my heart skip a beat.

Kyle gave the baby his fingers to suck on. It was erotic in the most uncomfortable way. Winston was hungry and gulped milk past my presumptions of an infant's capacity. I'd seen my sister suckle her children, especially the oldest, when I was a teenager; Ike's son drank primarily from bottles, enthusiastic and yielding, smiling up at Kyle, who smiled back down, radiant. Winston nursed at Kyle's fingers, first one and then two, and Kyle's contentment moved me, threatened to break my heart. "He shares my deportment," Kyle said of Winston, whose gurgling was robust and jovial at all times. "I know we're not blood-related, but he's got something of me in him. Wouldn't you agree?"

Kyle's hands, so unsteady in mine in those days, cradled the baby with such confidence and ease. "You'll never know me, Winnie," he said, rocking Winston on the balcony overlooking Hyde Park at twilight, "but maybe someone, your daddy or your bubby, will tell you about me, that I held you in my arms and rocked you at sunset." I stood half inside the flat, half out, leaning against the doorframe as I listened to Kyle soothe his nephew. It made sense to me now, why he wanted to babysit. For a moment, Kyle looked back to me, catching my eyes, smiling, proud of himself and of the baby, for quieting, and probably of me for being there. Then he shrugged with a chill, and moved by me as he stepped back inside. It was still very much winter, after all, and I worried about their little bodies, both Kyle's and Winston's.

XXX

Kyle and I had both been witness to the deaths of elderly relatives. Mine was my paternal grandfather, who had died when he was quite old and I was too young to fully appreciate that he had formerly been a man not unlike that which I was becoming. Which is to say he had once been vital and potent, not that I would live to father sons with two women, or any women at all. I was 14 when he died, old enough to know that I was not exactly normal and yet still just young enough to feel there may be a chance for me to turn out that way. I was literally in the room when he passed, although by then he had been immobile and senile for so long that it hardly felt notable.

On the other hand, Kyle had been with his maternal grandmother when she expired. He was 8 at the time and she, in his retelling, was unaccountably ancient. "But I loved that woman," he once told me, "and though I did not know it at the time, with her died the idea that I could have been something other than what I would become — that somehow there may have been a straight, American Kyle Broflovski, who graduated from a state university only to be sent off to Vietnam. Who had a girlfriend and later a wife and children. My mother was literally living the American dream — until she abandoned it and went back to Old Europe. So yes, I think many things have died inside of me, the heir to some unfulfilled promise. Ah, well." He had told me this in the mid-1970s, when Britain if not the entire world seemed on the brink of collapse.

Well, now the idea that Kyle might die — correction, _would die _— was rather distinct. Some nights he sat in my lap and cried, and I held him, delighted with his body, its fleshiness and the abstract hardness of muscle and bone in his joints, his elbows, the powerful tendons in his legs and gaps between his fingers butting up against cartilage. Suddenly it was 1967 again, and we sat in my bedsit at Magdalen, his tears mingling with snot and blood in the aftermath of his shattered nose, begging me through his fear and pain to please, please help him, couldn't I mend him, please don't take him to a doctor.

It was 20 years later, and Kyle still feared, hated doctors. Aside from his own brother, he regarded them with suspicion. They looked not at the superficiality of your person, but at your very viscera. In his youth Kyle had come to fear, and rightly so, being pried open by surgeons, by boarding school nurses, by almost anyone professing to help whilst asking him to yield. I understood completely, but my own physician was a gay dilettante from the NHS; I saw him once a year and he tried to talk to me about literature, a conversation which never went very far as he knew very little, but he thought he knew more than I did. I think having a gay doctor made my life extraordinarily easy, as he never questioned it when I had appeared at the clinic in the past with, say, a case of syphilis. In any case, Kyle had no such doctor, and was now being traded back and forth by a team of private clinicians Ike had recommended. Very little could be done for AIDS patients. There was no great medicine to speak of; the best advice anyone could give Kyle was to avoid getting sick. They did give him ribavarin, and so far, he had managed not to fall ill. No one really knew what to do with him. The ribavarin quickly make him anemic and somehow even less hungry, but he persisted.

These were uncertain weeks for us. Slowly, life returned to its circadian rhythm. We woke together, and Kyle left for work. Sometimes I'd ask him not to go, and all he'd be able to say was, "But this is my job, dear," before going anyhow. My job was to wake up hours later, and type until my fingers callused. Sometimes I met Kyle at his office and we went to get a sandwich, but Kyle ate very little now, despite my best encouragements.

Other days I'd meet Wendy, and we'd talk. She was so tired all the time, caring for the baby, that even a team of nursemaids didn't seem to relieve her. I wanted to tell her so badly; I felt as though I were lying by _not_ telling her. She complained about Token. "He's dropped the baby thing altogether," she said. "Now he is fixated on Clyde. He's almost manic about it. I sympathize, honestly! But I wish he'd relax."

"Wendy," I'd said, "he's never lost anyone before. He's not sure how to handle it."

"He can barely speak to me, barely speak to Willa…"

"She's a baby. She won't notice."

"That's a bad attitude! He's her father! And this isn't his first death. You remember James—"

"Right," I said, feeling silly that I'd forgotten. "Right, right."

"I just wish there were something I could do for him, but he's acting so distant!"

"Well, he'll calm down." I was too drained, thinking of Kyle, to be supportive in any more active way. "If I lost my best mate, I'd—" I didn't know what I'd do. It bit away at me as we sat on the sofa, some Catholic urge in me to confess, confess, confess, dying to tell her, just struggling so hard internally with myself. Kyle didn't want that, didn't want anyone to know. I was going out of my mind, especially at this very moment. Willa was on the rug on her back, batting at some arched baby toy that make noises when she hit it, gaudy shapes hanging from its form, secured there by felt or something soft. She laughed at each jingling noise.

"I hope you're right." Wendy slipped down off the couch, careful not to crease her skirt, and she crawled over to the baby. "Is this fun?" she asked, lifting her voice an octave. "Do you like it, Wills?"

Willa answered by laughing, and waggling back and forth. It was the most purely joyful thing I'd seen in some time. Watching her for a moment, I was overcome with the distinct feeling that, no matter how dark and uncertain life was becoming, eventually it would be normal again. Then I looked down at the plate of sandwiches left on the table, and thought of how I'd eaten most of them, and Wendy'd had only one or two. They were such small sandwiches, too, and I reached for my forgotten cup of tea. It remind me of Kyle, of his appetite and how it vanished one day, of how I was supposed to be feeding him. He was impossible in that regard and I didn't have any ideas. Then I heard the baby laugh again, and Wendy was laughing with her, and I looked at them, smiling, and I felt how genuine it was, how glad I was to be here in this moment. It felt so normal, and yet what was normal was changing by the week, and I didn't know if, come next week, I would be able to have these moments. But I scolded myself internally for being overdramatic, got on the floor myself, and tried to laugh with them for a while.

XXX

My mother rang, which was rather unexpected. Of course she had a genuine affection for me, being my mother and all — or, perhaps more significant, being the mother of two children in the post-war mothering years, when her identity couldn't have been fashioned from anything more interesting than being my mother. Despite this, I always thought my father had some kind of sway over her that might prevent us from speaking, were he and I ever to be at odds, which of course we now were.

Unfortunately, her call was anything but good news.

"It's your uncle," she said, voice hollow and far wearier than I remembered it being. "He's, well — he's passed, Stanley. I'm so sorry."

I knew which uncle she was talking about — I had only one. I hadn't spoken to my uncle James in decades, not since he'd shot my dog. I'd heard whisperings of him over the years — information translated down to me through my parents like ancient wisdom off of cuneiform tablets. Presumably, this was the last I was ever to hear, and it made me both sad, and curious — how had he died? Why had he died? Where was my father in all of this, the brother who survived him? I had no idea how old he was exactly, my uncle. Older than my father, of course, but it was the way of the Marsh family to somehow forget how to count when we were dealing with older persons. His birthday was irrelevant. I would always be the baby, the one that was younger than they all were, even at age 40; my uncle was older than I was, so it mattered little how high that number actually went.

It was mid-morning, and although my mother sounded off somehow, there was no sense of immediacy. It was chilly and dry in my flat; Kyle lay next to me, the shuddering breaths of his sleeping form reassuring and consistent. At first I wanted to shake him, but then I felt pity and let him snore.

"Is there to be a funeral, a wake?" I asked, unsure of how we'd handle this.

"Not really, no," my mother assured me. "He's Anglican, and lapsed anyhow, Stanley, no Last Rites or anything. What would the point be?"

"Well, what are you going to do? Wrap him up and throw him in a hole?"

"He's been cremated, if you must know."

"What about Dad?" I asked.

"Well, what about him?"

"Doesn't he care?"

My mother sighed. "Daddy feels there's no point in being sentimental." I wondered if my father would feel the same way when it came time for his last of kin to bury _him_. "I told him to call you, just so you know, but he just didn't want to do it. He's very busy, your father, graduating students who are finishing their theses. He's taken on two more this year, but he swears it's the final batch. Of course, he always says that. I wish he'd quit though, you know. Your father is just so industrious."

Or clinging to the only thing he could rely on to make him feel important. That, or industrious.

"Well, I don't — what do you want me to do?"

"It's a curious thing," my mother said, sounding as if she were suddenly engaged in a different conversation. "None of us knew he was dying."

"Perhaps he wasn't _dying_. Perhaps he just died." I wondered if my voice sounded to my mother how it sounded to me — brittle, tiny, terrified.

"Oh, sweetheart." She sighed. "People don't just die. There are vaccines now, you know, jabs and things—"

I was getting the distinct impression we'd had this conversation before. "Not everything can be cured with a jab. I need to know, what do you want me to do? Do you want me to come to Oxford?"

"Well, the reason I am calling — Stanley, he's left you his house."

"Excuse me?"

"His house, Stanley, in Nuneaton. He's left it to you."

"All right." I suddenly felt the burgeoning of an enormous headache. "What should I — what am I to do?"

Somehow, Kyle convinced me to drive to Oxford, where my mother would give me the keys to the flat, and then continue onto Nuneaton. The house was not in the city proper, but a bit out of the way. "We'll need a car anyway," Kyle advised, looking at a map the night before we left, a Thursday evening at home, rain battering the windows of my flat, rattling the Victorian glass panes. "It's the country, dear, we can't walk to a market, let alone town."

"He has a truck," I said, absent and unwilling. "I've also inherited the truck."

"I won't drive some country-bound mud-splattered truck around Warwickshire."

"Oh, suddenly you're too good for Warwickshire."

"Stanley, I've _always_ been too good for Warwickshire."

XXX

"I'd like to teach you how to drive," Kyle said somewhere around Banbury. He'd never owned a car in his own right, and this one we'd borrowed from his parents, a 1983 Jaguar Sovereign. It gleamed up the M40 fluidly, although Kyle was rusty on the driving; the last time I'd seen him behind the wheel was 20 years ago in London. "But it's not the most important thing," he added, flicking wipers against the Midland mist. "But I'd like to teach you to do it. You should get a license. You can chauffer me around."

"I live in London. That's ridiculous." In the passenger seat, my legs butted up against the dashboard, I sat with my arms crossed, unhappy. I had lost my uncle, had been forced to subject myself and Kyle to my family's disapproval again in order to get the keys to my late uncle's house, I was hungry, and I was tired, and rather than grieve for this man who represented the best hours of my childhood, I was trapped with the knowledge of how much was going wrong. I sighed against the window, grateful it wasn't Kyle, but torturing myself with the notion: What if it had been Kyle? What if I wasn't with him when he died, what if someone kept us apart, what if I was with him and it didn't bring him comfort, what if they wouldn't let us be together, whoever they were, the amorphous idea that like my mother, everyone in England had disapproving looks for us? I knew that was ridiculous, that Kyle's parents and brother respected my longstanding place at his side, even if they didn't specifically like me.

The English greenery we traversed to get to Nuneaton was boring me, and I started hallucinating about driving. How was Kyle doing it, both talking to me and controlling a whole machine? I asked him.

Of course, he just laughed at me. "Oh, when you know how, it's not something you forget," he said. "It's very silly to be like this, it comes like second-nature. I'll teach you, dear, you'll pick it up quickly."

I wasn't sure I wanted to know how to drive, but I figured it was best to nod and say, "Of course, darling," and keep my thoughts to myself for the rest of the ride. It wasn't a long drive, not that I had been on many long drives. I couldn't remember any lasting more than three hours. I said this to Kyle and he laughed at me again.

"Oh, that's ridiculous," he said. "My family drove all over this island when I was young. It's six or seven hours to St. Ives."

"I've never been to Cornwall."

"Forget Cornwall, then, it's conceivable to drive for days on end in America."

"Oh, America."

"Yes. My family would rent a car in New York and drive all the way down to Miami Beach to see my grandmother. Oh, god, it took _days_ _and days_ and we stopped so often. I was very young, you know, she died when I was 8, but I remember being pent up in that little car, it smelled like leather, and we just rolled along while my parents argued and argued. My father had to act put-off by Florida, or something, but I think he actually liked it. And beaches—"

"I've been to beaches," I said.

"But not like English seaside beaches, dear, I mean these long, sparkling stretches of smooth sand, and the waves are so tall they'll knock you over, although of course I was very small so if I went back I might find they weren't that big—"

"Isn't that always how big things seem," I remarked.

"Is that a jab about Clyde?" he asked.

"Not really. I don't know." We were silent for a moment, only the sound of the wipers on glass and the beginning of late-winter rain to distract us. Then I said, "Why don't you go live in America? If you like it there so much?"

"Why would I?" Kyle's eyes turned from the road very briefly to shoot me a confused look. "I'm British."

"Well, but not entirely, or—"

"No, entirely. It's like a novelty, Stanley, I don't want to live there. I wouldn't have anyone, I wouldn't have a job or — I couldn't take you with me."

"Couldn't you? Not that I would want to go — I mean, I would go anywhere with you, darling, but I've never been there—"

"You couldn't follow me there, no, not if I were to move there permanently, because you would need some reason to be there, like a job or a spouse, and, well. You know. I'm afraid I wouldn't count, you'd have to find a nice lady." He shook his head and refocused on his driving, fixing his eyes to the open lane stretching ahead of us. "Keep your eyes on the map, dear, all right? I don't want to miss the turn-off."

"Oh, certainly." I picked up the map from the floor where it had been lying abandoned since we'd left Oxford and merged onto the M40. I ran my fingers up the trace of road Kyle had lined in acid-yellow highlighter. "Ah, there's a traffic circle we'll be coming upon, near Coventry."

"Thank you." Kyle nodded, and I crushed the map in my sweaty hands. He was running the heaters at their highest settings.

XXX

I didn't know what I'd expected to find in Nuneaton, but it was basically how I remembered it from my youth. The town center was mostly empty in the rain, and Kyle decided it was too wet to go scouting for George Eliot sights. I made him go to a small sandwich shop with me and then stop at an Iceland supermarket for provisions of some apples, loaves of bread, milk and two boxes of Wheetabix (which Kyle assured me he would eat), a package of generic-looking deli meat which was supposedly rosemary ham, cans of tuna, a jar of mayo, potted prawns, three rolls of plain digestives and one roll of chocolate, pressed apple juice, packages of cheese-and-onion crisps, a vacuum-sealed package of four tomatoes, a stalk of celery, a long and fat cucumber, and finally, he ran back while we were in the checkout lane to grab a huge brick of a Dairy Milk bar.

"This food seems very random," I said, throwing the crisps in one of our bags on top of the digestives. "Are you really going to eat all this?"

"You're very stingy with food, do you know," was all he said in response.

"I mean, you're supposed to be eating, so why don't we go get something more fattening?"

After this he ran back to the dairy aisle and grabbed a tub of really thick yogurt and a big block of mild cheddar. _Then_ he said, "Wait, hold on," and disappeared into the aisles again, returning with a package of Cumberland sausages and two cans of Branston-brand beans. "Is this all right with you?" he asked, flinging a fiver at the clerk.

"Yeah, that's great," I said, tossing the cheese in on top of the crisps. "Whatever you want, honey."

The clerk immediately shot me a baffled look. She was a middle-aged woman in a red button-down shirt and red waistcoat that didn't really fit her, with ear-length choppy hair. Her confusion melted into an open-mouthed gape as I stared at her. Then I shook my head and smiled.

"Thanks so much," I said, seizing our three little bags in one hand. Kyle hurried out ahead of me, not bothering with the umbrella tucked under his arm, holding his mackintosh shut with a hand. It was unusual to see him in something so shapeless. Anyway, I didn't feel any of his panic, perhaps because I felt we were on my turf now or something. Not that I had been there in ages, because I hadn't, but I was preternaturally calm anyhow, tossing the bags into the boot and climbing into the passenger seat. My trench was open as well, belted behind me, and I was a bit wet when I sat down, finally glad that Kyle was blasting the heat, as I dried off before we'd even left the car park.

We got to my uncle's house at about 6, the sky dark and the key difficult to wrangle. We both tried twice before I managed to get the door open. I braced myself for something to come at us, some animal or ghost or crudely installed medieval security deterrent. Obviously nothing did, and I flipped on the lights to see that not much had changed in 25 years, except there were more rifles hung on the walls, and the place was in a general condition of mess. My uncle James and Ned had never been exactly interested in home décor, and Kyle absolutely recoiled at everything.

"All of these guns!" he said, shrinking from one hung up next to the door. "What the bloody hell! I thought people were supposed to lock these up! Someone could — I don't even want to think about it!"

"Well, no one ever did," I said, going to the refrigerator to put away our cheese and sausages. I realized we hadn't gotten anything to drink, but there was a bar in the corner, and knowing my uncle I assumed it would be well-stocked. He also had an army of bottles of different brown ales, mostly Newcastle.

"Do you think they're loaded?"

"Yes, probably." I slammed the refrigerator door. "I don't want them, you know, I'll sell them or something.

"Jesus Christ," Kyle muttered, stumbling toward the couch. "I think I have to sit down. How did your uncle live here? And how did he die here, do you think it was one of these guns?"

"No, no." I came toward the couch with a bag of crisps and a roll of digestives, ready to investigate the bar situation. I handed Kyle the food and sat down. "He wasn't the type to have a rifle accident. Those things were like children to him, you know, hunting was his religion or something."

"What a depressing religion." Kyle ripped open the crisps and sort of nibbled at the edge of one. "It never occurred to me until just now that some people consider killing to be a fun pastime. Isn't that odd?"

"I'm sure some hunters in one of the big houses up the road have sat around wondering how some people consider buggery to be a fun pastime, you know, it's not as if there's only one way to enjoy life."

Kyle buried his head in his hands, crossing his legs atop one another. "This is just a lot, Stanley. I need a moment."

"All right." I kissed him on the top of his hair and decided to let him sit there having his moment and eating crisps while I snuck around a bit. The sofa faced a giant mantle, over which hung a pair of majestic antlers that belonged to an elk my uncle had shot and eaten long before I was born. It did seem someone had been through the house, and parts of it bore the telltale signs of my mother's particular cleaning methods, streaks on all the mirrors and murky blue water in all the toilets, seats down. She hadn't mentioned anything about cleaning, but why would she? It was like them, my parents, to burn up and bury my uncle without telling me, rush up here and empty his house of anything I might like or take an interest in. Before we'd left London, I'd wondered if Kyle and I might find anything incriminating, love notes or gay pornography or anything of sentimental value. It was clear now that we weren't going to, either because it never existed, or by design. We'd never know which.

The second bedroom, where my sister and I (mostly me) had slept as children, was no more, full of boxes of ammunition, old financial records and newspapers, and fitness equipment. Nothing interested me as I picked through it. Although they were only half-brothers, this hoarding reminded me very much of my father's inclinations, and a bit of my own that I'd resisted by generally being acetic with personal belongings other than photos and novels and papers of mine. Maybe it was a shared Marsh family trait. My sister seemed to enjoy hoarding children. I didn't care about any of this, though.

Later I found a bottle of sherry and cracked it open. It had to have been a recent purchase, as it wasn't dusty like some of the older bottles of vermouth and bitters. I made myself a drink in one of the old tin tumblers from the cabinet over the bar and started a fire with logs from a pile by the hearth as Kyle complained about how cold he was, pacing by the windows. Then I went to sit down, bringing my drink and some tumblers and the sherry.

"Well, darling," I said, kicking my legs onto the trunk that served as a cocktail table. "What are we going to do with this place?"

He narrowed his eyes at me, refusing to sit. "Oh, it's 'we' now, is it."

"Yes. Hasn't it always been?"

This placated him, and he sauntered to the sofa, sitting beside me. "You might like to keep it, I suppose," he said, reaching for the sherry. "As a token of remembrance for your beloved uncle."

"Oh, darling, would you like that? A holiday home in Nuneaton?"

He was pouring himself sherry in a tumbler, making a face of utter disdain. "I'd rather repair somewhere tropical, or at least warm and lovely," he said. "Three years of uni was enough Midlands for me."

"Then I'll sell it."

"You can keep it, you know, it's all right by me." He handed me my tumbler of sherry, swirling it gently into my hand. "Rent it, maybe, make a profit."

"I've no use for profit. And _things_ are anathema to me."

"Yes, so I'm aware. Except for princess phones." He paused to drink. Then, wiping his mouth, he said, "This sherry tastes metallic."

"Well," I said, dwelling, "everyone needs a telephone."

"I don't like it here, in this cabin. I like my flat. If you don't want to keep it, I think we'd best pack things up and meet with an estate agent. Do you think it'll take long? Two days? Three?"

"I think if we bag things and toss out them like rubbish, we'll make it work. I'll get rid of the guns first, first thing in the morning — maybe there's a shop in town. I mean, there _must_ be. … Are you _sure_ you don't want to hang onto it?"

"No! I'm done with Warwickshire, do you understand? I don't want to go anywhere." His voice became very tight. "I just want to go to work in the morning and sit in my flat at night and try to make the precious time I have left mean something, do you know?"

"Darling."

"_Stanley_." He finished his sherry, and reached for the bottle.

"Should you be drinking that?" I asked.

He shook his head. "Well, no, but—"

I took it from his hands. "I won't let this thing destroy you."

"You don't have that ability! I know you're a writer, but you can't just invent some fiction that everything is all right. It's _not_, it's not all right. I want to spend my life enjoying it."

"Maybe you should quit working, then."

"But that's what I enjoy doing!"

I really didn't want to have a fight about this, alone in the dank cabin my uncle had left me. "Stop being such a fatalist, Kyle."

"Stop making everything feel so fucking normal! Gah, I'm bloody freezing!"

On a rocker by the corner there was a pile of quilts, and I got up and brought one back to Kyle, draping it across his shoulders. "Here's what I'll do," I said, wiping some of the sweat from his brow. "I'm going to heat up some bangers and beans, all right, and make some cheese toasties too, if that's okay by you. Then we'll eat some supper, and you can drink as much sherry as you want, but there's also a tea kettle and I'll make you as many cups as you can drink, and we'll do a little clearing and sorting and get into bed. I suppose in the morning we can go into town or maybe to Birmingham for some boxes—"

"I'm too tired to go all the way to Birmingham—"

"_Shhh_, all right, we'll just go to town and get some boxes and on Monday we'll meet with an agent and get rid of the house. We'll box things up and put them in the road and I'll get rid of the guns first, I'll take them to Oxfam or something, whatever's nearby. We'll tell the agent we just want rid of it, okay, we don't care how much it costs, and I'll say _we_ as many times as I have to, I want everyone in Nuneaton to know you're here with me, okay? And we'll drive back to London—"

"I want to teach you how to drive—"

"—we'll drive back to London, darling, and we won't drop in at Oxford, okay, to hell with my parents, I don't care if I never see them again."

"How can you not care if you never see them again?" Kyle sniffed, pulling the quilt tight around his trembling chest, which looked awkward with the tumbler in his hand, but he didn't want to put it down, his grip very tight. I pried it from his grasp and put it on the trunk. "They're your parents, Stanley, that's your family—"

"I'm done," I said. "I hate them. It's over. I'm done."

"I don't understand—"

"They couldn't even give me this house without scrubbing away anything worth having," I said. "They wouldn't let me see my uncle, or even know he'd died. They've done everything they can my whole life to curb my interest in any single thing I might love. I'm done, it's over."

"But your mother—"

"Kyle, I love you." I put my hands on his cheeks, kissing him very still on his mouth. He responded, dryly, dropping the quilt to grasp my hands. "We'll be okay," I said against his lips. "I don't want anything in my life that distracts me from you. We can hold on a little, okay, you—" I licked at the tears in the corner of his eye, which in another setting might have felt sexual, but it didn't to me, not then — I just didn't want him crying, and it was the quickest thing I could do to stop it. "You're my family," I said, finally, dropping my hands to grab his waist.

"Not even this house, your uncle…"

"He shot my dog when I was 15, all right, and I didn't hear from him until he died and left me his fucking house? What the bloody — what am I going to do with a _house_?"

"You said you'd sell it," Kyle said.

"Well, these people!" I let go of him, and I got up. "I'm going to make those sandwiches, all right, and the beans and Cumberlands. Is there anything else you need?"

"I'll just nap a bit," he said, reaching for the sherry as I walked away.

We had a brief, tipsy dinner, and although Kyle didn't eat as much as I wanted him to, he did finish an entire sausage, and most of the beans. "I can't," he said, poking at the cheese toasts I'd put on his plate, and the stiff slices of winter hothouse tomato. "I really can't, I'll lose it, it's just too much — it's like digestion exhausts me."

"Can't you try—"

"Maybe a less tiring night." He sighed, pushing his plate away. "I know it's early, but let's do something about bed." _Something_ was changing the sheets. ("I don't want to sleep in these if he died in them," which I wouldn't have minded, but I couldn't refute it, because we simply didn't know.) There was that moment, the same moment we always had before bed then, when we paused to reach for each other, mimicking the way it was _before_, when we didn't know there was something treacherous in our union. I was aroused when he kissed me goodnight, behind the ear, his hands against my shoulders. Then he rolled over and snapped off the lamp by his bed, muttering "I love you" and burying his face in a fresh pillowcase.

It was not that late and I was emotionally drained, maybe, but more numb than sad, and not very tired. I stayed up in bed for a while reading Fleming by lamplight, amused that my uncle should have loved such delightfully post-war posturing. I could tell he'd read the whole collection often and thoroughly by the fraying pages and the loose bindings, the creases bisecting pages where he'd taken pauses at each chapter break. I finished _Live and Let Die_ that night; it didn't dispel my erection at all, and I fell asleep with it poking into Kyle's thigh, against his sweaty pants, barely interested in doing anything about it. I dreamed about it, though, and woke up around 4 a.m. with a start before I came. By then I was awfully tired, though, and I tucked my head back in the crook of Kyle's neck and put it off for the morning.

We spent the rest of the weekend cleaning, and Kyle was an immense help. He was not _exactly_ an immaculate person, but he had an ordered sort of approach to housekeeping that came in rather handy. He took on the role of matron-director with ease, and I performed the physical labor of hauling boxes (purchased from an in-town shop in bulk) and shifting furniture, rolling rugs and securing stacks of yellowing paper with twine. It struck me only once or twice during the afternoon that we were dismantling an entire life, and when I was tired in the evening from exerting myself, I began to wonder if my uncle had left me this house at all, or if this wasn't my father being vindictive by shuffling the work off to me.

"Your mother wouldn't have had that legal paperwork for us if that were the case," Kyle pointed out. He'd given up on the sherry and had made it his mission to finish all the Madeira, and when he'd accomplished that task he'd begun on the Shiraz. I worried for him, wondering if he might not be better served just stabbing himself in the liver and seeing what happened, but he was in good spirits and we were eating crisps and laughing about all the odd old things in the house, and I was having some whisky I'd found in crates in the storage room. "Let's take that with us," he said, inspecting a dusty bottle. "The rest of the crate, I mean. You like that well enough. And you've got plenty of places to store it, so long as you never move in with me."

"It's nothing personal, you know," I said.

"Ah, ignore me, I'm cautionless and inebriated." When Kyle was uncautioned and drunk he liked to dance, and he got up to put on a record, some kind of old jazz, and we spun around the sofa, his arms up on my shoulders, but he kept trying to lead. When that ended up in a tangle we just spun around for a bit until we were both laughing at ourselves and each other, spilling back onto the couch, Kyle reaching for his wine in a tin tumbler. "How drunk are you?" he asked me, pushing my disarrayed hair back into place with two fingers.

"Me? I'm not drunk."

"But you never dance."

"I danced with you at your brother's wedding," I said. "I've danced with you before."

"Well, not nearly enough."

"You only dance when you're on coke, mostly."

He rolled his eyes, his teeth and the corners of his mouth purple like he'd been chewing on a pen cartridge. "There's something I'm sure I shouldn't ever do again," he said, and there was some weight in his voice, like he was sad about it. "But, yeah, usually I need to be wired. But now, I don't know, I'm unusually happy. This is fun; I'm glad I came."

"Were you thinking of not coming?"

"Can't say I was dying to, but Stanley, you're my — my _whatever_ we are. I'll always go — the rest of my life, however long, a couple of years—"

"I'm glad you came, then." To get him to stop, to stop him from putting finite language to it, I kissed him, and he slipped his arms around me again and kicked his legs around my waist and sat in my lap and ground our erections together until I pried away and said, "Stop, stop, darling—"

"I don't care if I come in my pants," he said, swallowing most of my protests, which was good, because he did, and so did I. Later I felt guilty as I showered that night, but at the time it felt like being home again after years at war, or a long trip abroad in a land where I didn't speak the language, or like the conclusion of a novel, the perfect last words that sealed off the narrative. When I was finished, heart beating, breathing deeply, I realized Kyle was crying on me, against my chest. When he gazed down at me I saw that he was just overwhelmed, drunk and sated but scared, too. We kissed again, and again, and didn't stop until Kyle said, "All right, my lips are chafing," and he pushed off of me and stumbled to the bedroom to change.

XXX

Time drags on and on when you are living daily with a sword dangling over you, but soon it was March somehow and I was pocketing the funds from the quick sale of my uncle's house, and the lorry as well. It was the first good money I'd made in a while, and I took Kyle out to Le Caprice. I'd heard the food was nothing to brag about, but I didn't care if it was; it was sort of a place to gawk and be gawked at, and it had taken a lot of badgering poor Wendy to get the table, at 9 on a Tuesday. "I've work the next day," Kyle moaned at me, but in the end he just went along happily, picking at his main, a giant pile of salmon cakes and rocket in a thick, mustardy sauce. He was beginning to look fairly pale, and getting him to eat was becoming a chore. He has such bizarre notions about food; maybe he was correct and I was stingy, but my tendency had always been to eat what I was hungry for when I wanted it without second-guessing myself, and without overcomplicating things.

Kyle now fretted about the other pouty queers and starlets and young peers sitting around us, an MP or two he recognized ("That one's a drunk, according to my mother," he said, nodding at an old man with a young brunette next to him) and he then worried about my fretting, which was kind of him but further nerve-racking. But we had fun and giggled at the silliness of the whole thing. Kyle was trying not to take it too seriously, but he was clearly enjoying it. He finished a whole lavender crème brulee for dessert, which was something. Then we tried to have a serious conversation over our coffees:

"I'm going to leave you everything, you know," which caught me well off-guard.

I shifted in my seat and said, "All right."

"I'm naming you my executor, of course. I'm provisioning for Winston, I've set up a small trust for him for something nice, university or, more likely, a small flat or something. So after that, it's all yours." He put down his coffee spoon, sighing. "I didn't really want to have this talk."

"Well, we don't have to do it now," I said, suddenly feeling very lonely, despite the fact that his foot was nudging against my calf this whole time.

"I thought you wanted to," he said, frowning. "I mean, I thought that was the point of, you know." He picked up the spoon again and gestured around the room.

"Well, no, I mean — I just thought you'd like it."

"Oh. Well, I did."

"It's all right, you know, I don't think—"

He smiled at me, genuinely, although his face had thinned enough that he actually looked least well when he smiled, his cheeks and the wells beneath his eyes looking sort of hollow. I wondered if he'd eat another dessert if I ordered it on his behalf. Then I pushed my plate of lemon cake with Chantilly cream at him, but he waved it away before I could encourage him to have some.

"Are you as tired as I am of all of our conversations taking on this macabre subtext?"

The question caught me off guard. "Well, I am, yeah, of course. But everything feels so foreboding lately."

"Maybe that can't be helped."

It had been a few weeks at least since Kyle fell apart entirely, but when we went back to my flat and got into bed, he let me hold him while he cried, not for anything in particular, just clutching at the lapels of my pajamas: "I'm scared and I don't know what to do, you're too good for me."

"What? That's insane, I'm not good enough for anyone," I said.

"That's not true, that's not true," he sobbed. "I never dreamed I'd have a man want to take me out to dinner, but you have and I don't know, I don't know why I couldn't have you when I was younger but I feel so stupid, so stupid, that was such a mistake."

"But you could have had me any time, darling, I loved you, I always did."

"I'm not worth all this fuss, I don't know, I was doing so well and I can't, I can't _just_ … _ah_, I can't pull myself together, Stanley, I'm sorry," and he wailed out "sorry" like an obstacle, choking on it. We got to sleep fairly late, and Kyle rang his office around breakfast and took the morning off.

The next exciting thing that happened was when Miss B called and said, "Eric won't shut up about having a party. You know, a boys' night."

"We don't do that anymore," I said. "We're done." I felt like I was done with an awful lot lately. The only things I wanted to make time for were Wendy, Kyle, and possibly working, although 'working' for me consisted of seeing a play or an opera and writing 800 words about its general relevance. Maybe my nascent memoir counted as working, but I didn't think so. I managed at this point to type up about a page or two each week, pending my general occupation with those other things.

"You don't have friends anymore?" Butters asked. "I know it's hard lately, Stanley, I sympathize. But that's just really stupid."

Butters was never that disparaging about anything, so I said, "Well, wait," and stammered until I could gather my thoughts into, "You know, you're right about that, generally, it's good to have friends, and maybe you should come over this week. But Eric's not my friend, and he's not _Kyle's_ friend, and, well, the last time we saw him was a bit of a jam."

"When was that?"

"Oh, god." I tried to think back to the weekend of Clyde's death. "Easily two months ago. And you know what, we haven't missed him. Or I haven't, anyway."

"Well, since Kyle seems to be, what do you call it, masking his calls—"

"_Screening_ them—"

"—so as to avoid Eric entirely, well, I'm inviting you fellows to a birthday party."

"Eric's birthday is in July."

"Yeah, it is," said Butters, "but Kenny's is next week."

So then we found ourselves at Eric's, where I suddenly felt miserably guilty for not having spoken to Kenny at all over the past couple of months. He was beaming in a new button-down and tight jeans; Eric seemingly just loved dressing him up, like a droll little doll.

"Thanks for coming," he said, handing me a flute of champagne. Something in his eyes seemed sad, and for a moment when we looked at each other, there was the kind of shared pain that I'd only ever felt between Kyle and I. Then he looked away from me, and turned back smirking. "There's a great heaping pile of charlie in the dining room," he said. "Maybe you'd join me?"

"Er, no, thanks," I said. "Very kind of you."

"It's on the house," he insisted. "In honor of my birthday. You used to care about my birthday, remember?"

I remembered, and it felt like a very long time ago. "Well, happy birthday," I said. "I hope you've a lot of them."

"We'll see," he said, rolling his eyes. "Perhaps longevity is overrated."

Kyle was in the kitchen talking to Miss B and Dougie. He was seemingly just drinking water, which relieved me, and I came over to stand with them.

"Oh," Kyle said, dragging me over by the arm. "Stanley's here."

"Yes, I am," I said. They were huddled together in front of a bay of wide windows that looked out onto the Thames, just a corner of St. Paul's sliced off to the left. It was sunset and everything was sliding into darkness on the east side of Southwark, although the lights on that side of the river made a pretty outline for the old Bankside power station, now dormant. Eric had some of the most intriguing views I had ever been privy to, but the City was so dead at night that I was not sure it was even legal to leave his flat when the street lamps went on. "I've been talking to Kenny. What's going on?"

Kyle glanced around the kitchen, which, in keeping with the windows, was fairly open, but no one was around and Kyle was quiet when he said, "I've told Douglas about my, ah, _condition_."

"I thought we weren't letting people in on that," I said.

"Well, we've been tested," Butters announced, eyeing Dougie. "The results have come just today, actually." His tone was much stiffer than it usually came out.

I steadied myself, ready to offer my support, a feeling slamming me in the chest that seemed like it could reach all the way through me and stop my heart from beating.

"It's negative," Dougie announced.

I felt some kind of relief from a crisis I hadn't been fully aware I'd been having over the past five seconds.

"Thank god," Kyle said, echoing my own thoughts. "Miss B, I don't know what I would have _done_, you've been so wonderful to me!"

"Of course," Butters said, putting a hand on Kyle's shoulder. "We have to be resilient now, all right?"

"What about you?" Dougie asked.

"Hmm?"

"What's your status?" he repeated.

"Well, I don't know," I said, "I've not been tested."

"You should be tested!" Butters said with a gasp.

"He's stubborn like that," Kyle said.

"Don't you want to know?" Douglas asked me.

"Why would I?"

"Why _don't_ you?"

"Because what are they going to know if I _do_ know, all right? Not much more than we know now, except I'll have to tell everyone and upset them. I'm healthy, all right, look at me—"

"They say it can incubate for _10 years_!" Dougie squeaked.

"What if you're negative, don't you want to know?" Butters pressed me.

"I prefer not to think about it!"

Dougie and Butters stood there staring at me, and Kyle took my arm.

"That'll do," he said, patting my hand. "Stanley's been good to me, he's been so good to me." He sounded like he was trying to be upbeat, but the words just made me anxious. I was about to answer him, to say "Of course" or something cursory, and then—

"I'm positive."

In shock, I turned, and Kyle's hand dropped from mine.

"You were eavesdropping on us!" Kyle said to Kenny, not with anger but in shock. Then his eyes narrowed and he said, "Did Eric send you to do this? How did he know what we were talking about this?"

"Eric?" Kenny rolled his eyes. "Oh, no, he's hogging all the coke in the dining room, so I slipped out. And I heard you, and I didn't want to interrupt you, so—"

Butters beckoned him over, and in a very low voice he said, "Kenneth, did you say—?"

"Yeah, I said." He left his champagne flute on the counter and walked toward us.

There was a moment of tenseness when none of us said anything, and all that could be heard was Eric's awful music blasting from the living room, some girlish pop that whined and whined and made the moment twist into something surreal. Then Kyle said, "Does Eric know?"

Kenny took a step back, and laughed sarcastically. "Ha, no," he said. "I'm not stupid enough to tell him."

"Well, you should tell him!" Butters suggested. "He needs to know, you know, it's probably sexually transmitted, so—"

"You might have killed him," Kyle said.

"Just a sec," said Kenny, taking another slight step back. "How do you know he didn't kill _me_?"

"You're a whore, or did you forget?"

"Oh, fuck, I _forgot_, thanks for reminding me."

"It's not a joke!" Kyle snapped. "It can make you very sick!"

"Of course it's not a joke! Are you — sorry, I know you think I'm an idiot or something, but I'm not. I went to a free clinic in Hackney, you know, these things exist, and I found out. I'm _pre-_ or whatever, okay, but I'm sure since you're in the same boat you understand."

"Well, I hope you won't tell Eric," Kyle said. I could hear in his voice how much he honestly feared this.

"Christ, of _course_ I won't tell him. You know, I've never done anything to you."

"Kenny, it's all right," I said, but he didn't care, he just stormed off. Needless to say, this put a serious damper on the rest of the party, until he returned an hour later, wiping at his nose. Eric swung him around until midnight, when I put my arm around Kyle and we left.

XXX

Token came to see me at my flat. He rang at 9:30 in the morning, quite business-like and soft-spoken. "May I pop by on my lunch break?" he asked. This was a ruse, or part of an elaborate façade in imitation of the working-class gent who truly has got a lunch break. Token was self-employed, and only because he so desired the normalcy that comes with handing out a business rather than a calling card. He had no set hours, and only imposed them on himself in a mimicry of people like Kyle and even Eric, who toiled perhaps above some people, but still under the supervision of others.

"Of course you may," I answered Token. "What time will that be? I only ask because I'm not yet out of bed." For effect, I yawned into the phone.

"No longer an early riser, I see."

"I was never an early riser, my lord. It just so happens that back when you saw me in the mornings, I often had classes. I should warn you, if you're only coming by for a fuck, that won't be entirely possible, as I'm still being dreadfully steadfast with Kyle."

"Doesn't Kyle wake up and go to work?" He sounded half reproachful, and half curious.

"Well, yeah, of course," I said. "But there's no one stopping me from going back to sleep. For that matter, he doesn't _live_ here." Finally figuring I would never get back to sleep, I sat up in bed.

"Do you know, Wendy's tried to work out for me the details of your relationship, and I find it hard to understand why you haven't moved in together."

"What good would that do?" I asked. "We're two men, not spinsters. I'm not about to propose to him or anything. I think that would make him rather sad."

"Oh." Token coughed into the phone. "_Well_," he said, stretching out in an awkward way that suggested he was not sure what to make of what I'd told him. "I usually take lunch at 12:25. If I take a taxi I can be over no later than 1. Does that give you enough time?"

"I'll see you at 1," I said conclusively. I hung up the phone and spent the next hour staring at the ceiling.

XXX

In fact, Token had only been by my flat once before: On a crisp March Sunday at dawn he had trailed me back home from a nightclub, and we had fucked rather quickly and deeply before falling asleep with the lights on and the windows open. This had been, oh, probably 10 years previous, during the heady days of sexual enjoyment known as the 1970s. It was not Camp we had been to, as that venue was not yet conceived, but an establishment known as The Girder, in the back of which there were iron girders running along the walls with steel shackles chained on either side, so you might strap your partner in. Being refined men, Token and I turned our noses up at this idea, delightful as the possibility sounded when the club first opened. Incidentally, the only time I returned to The Girder was shortly after I began living with Gary, who was delighted by these new, foreign, tantalizing ideas about the liberty we now had to shackle ourselves to something.

Being that it was mostly foreign to him, when Token came inside he took a look around and said, "Oh, you've redecorated," which was really a nice way to say that I had accumulated some furniture, as the last time he'd been over I'd been on the possession of my kitchen table, a handful of chairs, and the bed upstairs. (It was Gary who helped make my flat into less of a place to park my body during sex and respite. He was nesting for us, building a home, and Token's comment reminded me of this fact briefly, and I sniffled some disappointment that he would never bear witness to similar comments.)

"Well, it has been some time," I said. "Drink, my lord? I have whisky, but then I always have whisky. I could make you something, I don't know, a cup of tea."

"No, thank you." He took a seat at my kitchen table, but not before shedding his coat. "I will be quite fine. Thank you, Stanley."

I took his coat and expected him to sit down, but when I returned he was still standing near the door, arms behind his back, looking, frankly, a bit scared. "Well, I'm having a whisky," I said, to break the ice.

"It's 1 p.m.!" he cried. "Who drinks this early?"

I shrugged. "I think your wife does."

"Oh."

I sat down at the kitchen table with my drink; Token followed suit.

"Listen," he said. The words were coming to him gradually. "I must tell you something, Stanley. Two things, although one of them I'd like to tell you twice. And I'll layer them."

I raised my eyebrows; the whisky tasted unusually bitter to me.

"I've always loved you."

I spit a mouthful whisky onto the table. "Jesus! Don't say things like that!"

"Why not?" he asked, eyeing the fresh mess on the table. "It's true."

"Because a man who's in love with me wouldn't have told me he wanted to get married!"

"I had no choice." He was calm, speaking rationally, telling me with patience a story I'd relived a thousand times. "You know I had responsibilities. I had to make choices. I made bad ones, but at least I made them. I want you to know that I love you, Stanley. I always have. Being with you was the only time in my life I ever felt really happy about things, you know. You gave that to me and I love you for it."

"But you left me," I reminded him.

"Well, no. It was you who left me."

"Yeah, because you told me you wanted to get married to a girl!"

"Which didn't necessitate the end of our relationship."

"Well, Christ, my lord, what was I going to do, be a piece of ass on the side for a married viscount?"

"But I never gave you a difficult time for not wanting that to be your life, did I?" He sighed, shoulders slumped, and he looked, for a moment, very old. "Perhaps I should have taken you up on that whisky," he said, glancing at the mess on the table. "This is indeed a difficult conversation."

"Why?" I asked. "Are you dying?"

He looked right at me, eyes locking with mine. He didn't even need to say it.

Something inside me felt like it had broken — not in sadness, but in shock. I put a hand to my chest, and nodded at him, muttering, "I see."

"Well, that's what I wanted to tell you." He was very calm, but his eyes betrayed his words and even his demeanor. Men like Token were bred to keep themselves reigned in, to guard their feelings from both society and themselves. "It's AIDS, of course. Or HIV, rather, as I've tested positive. I probably don't need to tell you; after Clyde passed away, I'm sure we all realized it was something that could happen to any of us." He paused. "Or all of us."

Suddenly, confessions came pouring out of me. "Gary died of AIDS," I announced. "Very early on. Three years ago."

"I didn't know you'd kept in touch with him."

"I hadn't. His mother called me. But forget Gary. I, er—" Now it was my turn to sigh. "Kyle has it."

Token's eyes widened. "_Kyle_ does?"

"Yeah."

"Is he—"

"He's _all right_," I assured Token. "Not that I presume you care, but right before Clyde passed, actually — he became very ill with an infection, and we found out he had it. He's _okay—_" I was trying to reassure myself more than Token "—I want to emphasize that he is _fine_, for the time being; he can go to work and proceed normally, except for the horrid side effects from the virus itself, which rear their heads from time to inopportune time. But, really, he's not at death's door, at the moment, and I am very grateful." I punctuated this pronouncement by finishing the whisky I had left in my glass. "How are you?"

"Better than that," he said. "Well, no, not at all, I mean, I feel just dreadful, you know, for — for bringing this on my family. Wendy doesn't know. She may have it — I'm sure she does have it. But it's something she needs to hear from _me_, do you understand? Please don't tell her."

How could I refuse him? "Of course."

"Do you know, this whole time, I've only been trying to do what's right? And I love my daughter, Stanley — but of course, you know that." (I didn't, but I declined to respond.) "And I love my wife. That is the bottom layer of this confession, that I love the woman I have been married to for nearly two decades. I love her more than my parents love one another, which is remarkable, or perhaps not in this social climate, but I wanted to make sure you knew that you did a wonderful thing, finding her for me. If it hadn't been Wendy, it might not have been anyone."

"But that's just idiotic!" I snapped. I'd been silently stewing, and perhaps I was a bit jealous that what had begun as a confession of love to me had become, after a morbid pause, a confession of love for his wife, of all people. "If it hadn't been Wendy it would have been _me_, and we could have had our own faithful little marriage, and then there'd be no dying. But you had to go off and do the _right_ thing. Surprise, _Viscount_, there is no right thing. All scenarios end in pain."

"We shall see whom, if anyone, is pained by my intended ending," he said stonily. Then he recovered: "Let me tell you something. While we were _together_, furtively but happily, I waited for signs that you might stop _fixating_ on Kyle Broflovski and fall in love with me."

"I loved you," I replied.

"Yes, _loved_, past tense, but our relationship was not your great romance; it was something for you to enjoy while you were waiting for Kyle to confess to you. I could have thrown away my chance to have a family, take my station in society, and please my parents, but that would have meant doing it with a boy who would have thrown me away in a heartbeat, given that I was only second-best. So I _freed_ you. If you had ever given me a sign that you wanted to be with _me_, perhaps I'd have wanted to be with you. I love you, and it hurt me. I still love you. I can't help but look on you and see the boy I wanted so badly to return my feelings. But you didn't, and I have more self-respect than _that_."

"Oh, like I'd call marrying a woman and sleeping with blokes on the side self-respectful!"

"Wendy understands me," he replied. He was still quite calm, breathing evenly, voice scarcely raised. "I understand her. The only component of our marriage that has not been entirely consistent all these years is physical intimacy, and I dare say by the time most couples are in their 40s and have a child they have moved past that anyhow. My father's engaged in infidelities. I trust that hers has."

"Kyle and I are faithful," I offered, attempting to make a counterpoint, although I had no idea what I was arguing against, if not the idea that Token was just incorrect on all points he thought he'd gotten right this time. "And we've slept together quite regularly, albeit his … _health_, I suppose … has caused us to somewhat alter our behavior."

"Ah." Token smiled. "But you are newlyweds. When Wendy and I were freshly married we made love as if the world were ending and intercourse were the only stopper."

"How lyrical."

"Yes, well, I've an English degree, after all. And I know how much you love him. I don't know nearly as much about _him_, but I do know he's a tenacious little thing. If you and Kyle had a normal narrative of heterosexuality ahead of you, I think you'd find him, no matter how affectionate you felt toward him, hard-up for a new ideal. As it stands, you may never reach that point." He lowered his voice: "I'm so sorry, Stanley." He stood.

"Going so soon?"

"My only regret is that I wish to have been able to settle with you. In my set, true normalcy is extraordinary, and I wish I could have shared in that more fully."

I gaped at him while he retrieved his jacket. I could not believe so much about the scene that had just played out in my flat.

"Good day, Stanley. Please give my regards to your … partner?"

I shook my head.

"Boyfriend?"

"Sorry." I wasn't sure exactly what to say, how I was feeling — not well, of course, but the full impact of these disclosures has left me reeling, clutching the table for dear life. "We're _whatever_, you know."

"Well," said Token, "whatever, then."

"Yes. He's my _whatever_."

"I hope you and your _whatever_ are going to be all right," he said. "I love you, Stanley, all right? I'm so happy to have known you."

"My whatever and I are going to be okay," I said, not bothering to get up and open the door for him.

"Yes, I'm sure you will." He paused in the doorway for a moment, looking at me. He was smiling. "Goodbye, now." Then he left.

That was the last time I ever saw Token.

* * *

So if you read all 35,000 of my words, you're awesome. I hope you enjoyed. Happy Halloween!


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